The Canadian forest products sector, like many industries in this country and around the world, has faced unprecedented challenges over the past year because of Covid-19.

The struggle for all of us to find our way started when the World Health Organisation declared a global pandemic in early March 2020. The initial challenge was threefold: we needed to ensure our people’s safety, keep our critical supply chain moving, and provide consumers with basic necessities.

The sector sought out and embraced its role as an essential industry, and safely delivered sustainably sourced, forest-based products that people needed during the pandemic. Things like lumber and wood products for construction and pulp for medical masks, hospital gowns, toilet paper, and sanitary wipes have never been in greater demand.

We immediately recognised that protecting the health and safety of our workers would be essential to meeting these challenges head on. Forest Products Association of Canada (FPAC) member companies checked their competitive interests at the door and pursued a common vision to keep everyone safe and sustain operations. More than 200,000 workers in over 600 communities brought forward a host of additional measures, effectively demonstrating our deeply engrained commitment to health and safety.

As the important work continued, Canada’s forest sector leadership moved swiftly to work with partners in government, labour, and across the supply chain to ensure we kept essential products moving. We shifted gears to enable recovery by working with the federal government on key priorities which included:

  • Ensuring forest sector workers, families and communities received the support they would require as we pushed through the pandemic;
  • fast-tracking innovation to further transform our industry and expand our product offerings;
  • growing markets for Canadian wood and wood fibre-based products here at home and around the world; and,
  • kick-starting capital investment and job opportunities by securing greater certainty and long-term access to the working forest while advancing our world-leading sustainable forest management credentials.

In the initial stages of the pandemic, the forest sector’s role in the manufacture of personal protective equipment (PPE) came into clear focus. It became evident that premium reinforced pulp from Canada’s northern forests was a key input to manufacturing medical masks – and underlined that we needed to do everything possible to leverage our renewable, homegrown resources to provide for families during a time of urgent need.

Earlier this year, FPInnovations, a Canadian research and development centre, announced the successful development of an eco-friendly, biodegradable mask, that is ready to be manufactured in Canada and used by the public.

The increased demand for lumber due to a surge in home renovation projects plus a strong North American housing market has been welcome news over the course of the pandemic. As of January 2021, our sector has experienced a year-over-year increase of 10% in softwood lumber production, according to Statistics Canada data. Apart from a large dip in April of last year, as pandemic-related measures came into full force, production volumes remained fairly high throughout the year and hit a peak last September.

Canada and the UK have enjoyed a long and established bond and commercial relationship. The UK is Canada’s most important commercial trading partner in Europe and that certainly extends to the trade of forest products. Between January 2020 and January 2021, we saw an increase in Canadian lumber exports of approximately 129%. The UK represented the sixth largest export market for Canadian lumber during that period, increasing by about 57% compared to the year previous.

The past year has seen continued advances in the use of wood and new mass timber projects in construction not only in Canada but around the world. While architects, engineers, and urban planners are increasingly recognising the sustainability of these options, the Canadian Wood Council (CWC) is working with technical experts to evolve the National Building Code of Canada to provide safe, effective, and GHG efficient wood construction alternatives.

In this country and abroad, demand for wood is expected to remain strong, largely because of the significant surge in housing construction, repair and renovations – and FPAC’s members will continue to provide high quality products from well managed forests. Canada is globally recognised as a responsible supplier of forest products from legal and sustainable sources. The responsible way in which we manage this resource is very much a competitive advantage in the global environment.

Through 2020 and well into 2021, we continue to experience the biggest health and economic crisis of our lifetimes and it has underscored the greatest strengths and vulnerabilities of our country, and many others.

For the forest sector, 2021 and onward opens a window of opportunity to develop a long-term plan to accelerate innovation in the forest bioeconomy and forestry clean tech, make more forest-based products here at home, build bigger and better with Canadian wood, and get more Canadians working. It also puts us in a position to support Canada’s achievement of a net-zero carbon economy by 2050 https://www.forestryforthefuture.ca/ posts/sustainable-forest-management-will-help- drive-our-net-zero-future.

All governments face immense challenges as they look to rebuild, regrow, and reinvent our collective post-pandemic economies. As Canada and the world gets moving again, our forest sector is in a unique position to help drive economic recovery, both at home and abroad. FPAC recently published Innovative, Sustainable, Resilient: Recommendations from Canada’s Forest Sector to Drive Economic Recovery and a Net-Zero Future which highlights the opportunity before us that can greatly support recovery, while providing solutions to build an even more sustainable and lower-carbon economy. On the world stage, it means expanding export markets and ensuring that key trading partners have access to much-needed and sustainably managed wood products.

Working with the federal government, provincial governments, and our partners across the country, Canada’s forest sector is committed to leveraging our experience and innovative capacity to tackle future challenges head-on and emerge from this crisis stronger than ever. This, in turn, will spur innovative product developments and enhanced trading relationships with key partners like the UK.

Stay safe. We are keeping our fingers crossed that we will be able to see some of you in person at COP26 in Glasgow this autumn.