  B.C. WANTS A LUMBER DEAL? The two newest lumber stories I have seen deal with British Columbia. urlLink the first article the Globe and Mail has discovered that an American industry group, the Coalition for Fair Lumber Imports [a creature of Dewey Ballantine's John Ragosta], is complaining to the U.S. government about a "suspicious" decrease in Canadian stumpage rates. B.C. officials say rates have decreased, but only based on a 15 year-old formula. It does seem suspicious, however, that during the course of the U.S. antidumping case and ongoing the WTO dispute American imports of lumber from B.C.
have actually increased , while imports from all other provinces have decreased. This discrepancy is hard to explain if B.C. has changed nothing about the way it handles stumpage, duties, and lumber exports over the last fifteen years. But what do I know, I'm no expert. In one article, B.C. Lumber Trade Council president John Allan says urlLink now is the time for a deal , before Iraq pushes this issue onto the back burner, though urlLink in the first article , Allan says the Coalition is only trotting out this information now to force the Canadians back to the table.
I think Ottawa doesn't need to make a deal at this precise moment and feels it can push away from the table. On the other hand, now that the U.S. is pushing a "policy bulletin" outlining changes it wants from Canadian producers and provinces, B.C. wants a deal before it gets singled out for especially harsh treatment. 
