COFI Leaders Say Forestry Is Alive And Well
Friday, September 27, 2013 @ 12:58 PM
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COFI’s Doug Routledge, Nick Arkle and James Gorman outline forestry’s recovery. Photo 250 News
Prince George, B.C. – Setting out on a path to mitigate the damage done by the mountain pine beetle. That is the focus of the Council of Forest Industries as the B.C. forest industry’s recovery from the devastation gathers momentum.
COFI Chair Nick Arkle and Vice-president of Northern Operations Doug Routledge were on hand Friday morning to introduce COFI’s new President and CEO James Gorman to the local media. Gorman, who took over the post September 16th, is brand new to the forestry game having worked for 19 years with the provincial government, serving as a deputy minister in a number of ministries including Shirley Bond’s tenure as Education Minister.
Arkle says forestry is coming out of “the toughest recession the industry has probably ever been in, and we thought maybe it’s time to re-design our organization” at the same time the industry is doing that. Arkle says an intensive search for a new president was conducted of private and public companies and within the industry itself, but “we really wanted someone to come in with a fresh set of eyes and a strong skill set.” Gorman was selected.
Gorman says “the reason I was attracted to it (the presidency) is because it’s a backbone industry, it is an economic generator for the province and, while its gone through a difficult time, it’s recovering at a steady rate.” He calls this an exciting time for the industry and says he hopes to “make the bridge between the industry and government in order that we can work on and identify what are the most important policy priorities that government can do that will strengthen the industry and strengthen the benefits for those who work in our forestry communities, and in so doing strengthen those communities.”
Gorman says he will be meeting with member companies and Forests Minister Steve Thomson to get their priorities, and will meet with forest community mayors and chambers of comers to find out what they consider as top concerns. He also says it makes sense, for both the industry and communities, to surround yourself with people with policy depth.
Arkle sees five key areas in terms of public policy: short and mid-term timber supply impact post-mountain pine beetle; timber pricing and whether the current system is working; competitiveness; labour, which Arkle says “is huge. We all are having a tough time holding onto skilled trade positions within our companies. So it’s not only how you bring new people into the industry, it’s how you retain the ones you’ve already got when there are so many other competing sectors trying to lure them away”; and finally market diversification.
Regarding markets Arkle says “we’re never going to walk away from the American market, it’s huge. We’ve got a huge population base to the south of us, they’ve got an insatiable appetite for building when conditions are right and they need and want our lumber. So you’re never going to walk away from that market. But as we’ve learned over the last five years, when things go soft to the south it sure is nice to have others avenues for our lumber. I will always be a great supporter of looking for diversification and in Asia, I think we only have to look at the emerging markets that are over there, then ones that are already there, we’ve got to maintain those. And there will be times when they’re softer and we hope at that point that the American market will offset that softness in Asia.”
Gorman says Forests Minister Thomson will be leading a mission to Asia October 16th to 26th, and more than two dozen COFI members from several forestry companies will be going on that trip to both Japan and China. He noted that Pat Bell did as lot of work in opening door for the industry in China and “I’m glad to see that Minister Thomson is continuing to see the importance of that.”
Doug Routledge says “the B.C. industry has been active in Korea, Taiwan, Japan and China for a number of years. Those are the core Asia-Pacific markets for us. We’re diverting some of our resources from Korea to China at the moment, and it’s the just the nature of the Korean market right now. We’re in a maintaining rather than a developing mode. China we’re still pushing on the boundaries a little bit. Japan has always been a strong market and there are further opportunites there resulting from the earthquake.” He says it’s too soon to put resources in India, adding “it took us over twelve years to set the right stage for China to develop the way it did, so we’re in the early stages of setting the right platform to make some inroads into India.”
Comments
Alive, yes.
Well? I think that is debatable.
Improving over previous years? Yes, depends on what sector. Some people working in woodlands operations have been able to combine their work with work in the oil and gas fields.
In these types of discussions, there needs to be a distinction between the shareholders doing well versus the salaried employees doing well versus the hourly employees doing well … it is my impression that the news stories tends to reflect the first two groups and not so much the third … yet at the grassroots of our “forestry communities”, the third group is most directly related to the local economies
INHO, the reason that the industry is having a tough time hanging on to their skilled employees now is that the companies have tended to treat them as disposable during recent downturns … what goes around comes around … commitment to fair wages and long term apprenticeships would go along way … yet we see contract talks continuing to break down in this sector :(
INHO sb IMHO ;)
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