Midwest timber industry welcomes tariffs on Canadian lumber

Thirty-three percent of the lumber used in the USA previous year was imported, it said, with more than 95 percent coming from Canada.

The U.S. and Canada typically enjoy a friendly trading relationship, but things have soured in recent months.

Since then, Canada’s trade barriers have come under fire, including the tariff of up to 270 percent it imposes on dairy products.

However Wenran Jiang, a University of Alberta expert on China, says Canada needs a better plan on engaging economically with China rather than running to it whenever it has a falling out with the U.S. The Trump administration has vowed to renegotiate NAFTA on terms that would reduce USA goods trade deficits of $63 billion with Mexico and $11 billion with Canada a year ago.

The Trump administration is signalling an interest in making big additions to NAFTA.

Emerson says a small but powerful lumber coalition south of the border behind the tariff, adding it’s something we’ve seen many times in the past.

But his tune changed Tuesday morning.

President Trump on Tuesday downplayed concerns about a trade war with Canada after his administration slapped tariffs on Canadian softwood lumber. Trump tweeted on Tuesday that “we will not stand for this”. The duties will be retroactive 90 days for J.D. Irving and producers other than Canfor, West Fraser, Resolute Forest Products and Tolko. “We have 360,000 [lumber] jobs dependent on a level playing field with Canada”.

He says he is equally disappointed that Liberal Leader Christy Clark did not make it a priority to sign an agreement before duties were imposed.

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Ross explained: “We tried to negotiate a settlement but we were unable”. “That has been proven out in successive actions by the USA industry”, she said.

They need to wait until the final determinations, which likely won’t happen until late 2017, officials say, which means a legal challenge wouldn’t come before January 2018. The Commerce Department only said the duties were commensurate to the subsidies the companies received from the Canadian government.

That decision 1986 action has since set off some three decades of USA tariffs, Canadian protest, and global arbitration before both NAFTA and WTO courts, who have mostly sided with the Canadians. USA dairy farmers say the new accord has cost Wisconsin and NY companies millions of dollars. One firm declined to comment and three others didn’t immediately respond.

Americans have also long complained about Canadian dairy production.

Canada’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Chrystia Freeland, and Natural Resources Minister Jim Carr released a joint statement in which they declared, “The government of Canada disagrees strongly with the U.S. Department of Commerce’s decision to impose an unfair and punitive duty”.

The two countries are suddenly sparring openly over low-cost Canadian timber and Canada’s barriers to USA dairy products – disputes that go back years but rarely get such a public airing.

In fact, it goes back decades. Instead, she pointed out that Canada has won every court case on lumber against the USA, suggesting the tariffs would be challenged in court.

Lumber accounted for only 1.2 per cent of all exports and less than 0.3 per cent of all Canadian jobs previous year.

“It’s about 31.5% of the total United States market, so it’s a pretty big deal in terms of the Canadian relationship”, he said.

The Obama administration sought a new accord with Canada over softwood lumber.