FORESTRY AS AN ESSENTIAL SERVICE - By Ian MacNeill - Truck Loggers Association
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FORESTRY AS AN ESSENTIAL SERVICE
By Ian MacNeill
A t the end of March when the pan-
demic alarm bells started ring-
ing and workers were starting to get
to not be working.” He adds that for the
most part he and other contractors are
not interested in “handouts from govern-
assurances that if one of them gets injured
no effort will be spared in getting them
timely access to appropriate medical care,
sent home for quarantine, the provincial ment” that many of them might have to and there’s no substitute for a heli-vac. In
government hurriedly drew up a list of pay back anyway because of the size and time, protocols were established for evac-
“essential” services and industries. Ser- scope of their operations. uation procedures and Nelson is now ex-
vices and industries that were deemed Still, it is anything but business as usual, pecting the choppers to arrive when and
essential to “preserving life, health, pub- along with all the costs and inconvenienc- if they are needed.
lic safety and basic societal functioning,” es associated with “social distancing” at Added costs of adapting to this new
basically the kinds of things British Co- work, contractors are facing supply-chain normal are quite obviously having an
lumbians come to rely on in their daily issues as well as a variety of unique chal- impact on the bottom line. Transporta-
lives. They included forestry-related ac- lenges. There are minor irritants, such as tion has been a real bugbear. Where in
tivities, which came as good news to Bill ensuring that everyone who might need the past a crummy or pick-up might have
Nelson of Holbrook Dyson Logging on the use of a pen carries their own, to big had three to five individuals travelling
Vancouver Island. ones. For example, when the first wave of in it, it is now down to one or two. That
“We need to go to work,” said Nelson, panic hit, there were concerns that heli- means more trucks, more fuel, and more
who is also currently president of the copter evacuation services would not be difficulties in finding space for them all at
Truck Loggers Association. “After an available. This is obviously problematic in busy worksites.
eight-month strike, we couldn’t afford remote locations where your team needs
24 Truck LoggerBC Summer 2020
All photos: iStock
Fortunately, isolated logging camps are
a good thing in the pandemic environ-
ment. Employees coming in to get their
temperatures tested and are then grilled
about their recent travel and domestic
activities, and if deemed clean, enter a
community where everyone is presumed
to be safe. However, town-based employ-
ees present a different problem. Pretty
much everyone in the forest is safely so-
cial distanced while on the job, but you
never know what kind of contacts your
people are going to have when they go
home at night, so you have to have strict
protocols on-site and ensure they’re re-
spected. The good news is that employees
have been good about buying-in to the
new world order. In addition to helping in the fight on, General Manager Mark Evans’s
Supply chain issues have also been a against the disease, this unique and im- words and demeanor conveyed a cen-
problem. Instead of going to suppliers portant product also underscores how tral message: “Relax, there is going to
with a truck, loading up and driving important it is to maintain some degree be lots of toilet paper.” And there was.
away, all ordering has to be done in ad- of industry access to old-growth cedar, The company rapidly instituted social
vance, with consultations taking place which is essential to the process. “We’ve distancing measures and put the pedal
over the phone, or online; fortunately, been very careful to protect our cedar to the metal, and the great toilet paper
modern technology makes this a lot supply chain,” he says. “We’ve worked fiasco of 2020 ended with a whimper.
easier. Also, some town-based suppliers very hard to be a good customer.” Although the company is limited in its
have lost employees to quarantine and So far, Harmac has not experienced ability to increase output, which this
are working with reduced staff. “What supply chain issues. However, with the year will hit an estimated 60,000 metric
used to take a day to get now takes two general downturn in the economy and tonnes, it did make changes in order to
or three,” says Nelson. the expected downturn of housing starts get the product out the door and on the
There is also anxiety about the future. in the United States, there is concern shelves faster. They included reducing
All these new protocols are adding costs, about the future. There were fibre-access the product line to five or six “flavours”
costs that can only be vaguely estimated issues pre-COVID-19, and fears now until the pipeline was re-established.
now, and Nelson says he and other con- that they might worsen later in the sum- Distributors and retailers were fine
tractors he has spoken to are concerned mer. He and others in the pulp industry with that; they just wanted product on
these costs could put them out of busi- are doing everything they can “to alert the shelves.
ness. However, there is hope that the pro- our colleagues in Victoria that we need Although it operates more in the
vincial government will balance cost with help finding solutions to sourcing afford- consumer-products space, Kruger is in-
need and find a middle ground everyone able fibre.” extricably linked to forestry, says Evans.
can live with. Time will tell. There is another forestry-related prod- It needs a steady stream of both soft and
On other fronts, forestry-related ac- uct that has been thrust into the lime- hardwood Kraft to spin out the rolls. Like
tivities are not just providing jobs and light thanks to COVID-19, toilet paper. Harmac, Kruger has not experienced
keeping the economy from collapsing, Thanks to a combination of greed on the supply chain issues in terms of fibre, so
they are providing essential materials in part of would-be entrepreneurs stocking far. There are some concerns about future
the fight against COVID-19. Paul Sadler up in the hopes of gouging their neigh- fibre access because of the recent spate of
is general manager and CEO of Harmac bours with inflated prices, as well as fear sawmill closures, but the company’s sup-
Pacific, a Northern Bleached Softwood on the part of many consumers that they pliers know that it produces a product
Kraft (NBSK) pulp mill near Nanaimo. would simply run out, toilet paper dis- that is important to consumers. “There
Although it only represents about 5 per appeared from store shelves in the early are no guarantees ever,” says Evans. “But
cent of the company’s annual output, Har- days of the pandemic. It did not help that they’ll do everything they can to keep us
mac produces a spun-cedar lace product videos were popping up on the internet in fibre.” The company also benefits from
that is used to make protective clothing of people fighting in shopping aisles over having access to a large inventory within
needed by the medical community. He dwindling supplies. a radius of 25 kilometres.
describes the finished fabric as similar in As a result, it didn’t take long for Large and small, remote and urban,
function to Gore-Tex; it is tough, breath- the media to show up at the doors of the current pandemic is underlining the
able, comfortable to wear, and most im- Kruger Products, located on the banks importance of forestry to individuals and
portantly, it stops liquids. “Demand is of the Fraser River in New Westmin- communities alike. It is, and will remain
definitely up,” he says, because in addition ster, and the producer of 40 per cent for many years to come, an essential in-
to higher usage rates, buyers are stocking of all the toilet paper sold in Western dustry in British Columbia.
up for uncertain futures. Canada. When the cameras got turned
Summer 2020 Truck LoggerBC 25
The Kiwi Conundrum
It is possible that future forestry Zealand, so Lambert is familiar with in the pipeline to replenish them be-
classes at schools for young people the Kiwi forest economy. cause of the cessation of forestry oper-
entering the industry will include a About a third of New Zealand’s ex- ations upstream. When Truck LoggerBC
discussion of how quickly interrupt- port economy revolves around one magazine spoke to Lambert in mid-
ing forestry operations can inter- product, radiata pine, which is grown April he reported that forest companies
rupt a supply chain and affect a wide plantation-style, and when the shut- in New Zealand were “pleading” for a
range of industries and consumers down hit, exports ground to a halt. reopening of the industry so they could
alike. Of course, on one level you Buyers in China, who typically absorb replenish the depleted docks. “Impa-
can hardly blame the government as much as half of the export crop, hit tience is starting to set in,” he says.
of New Zealand for slamming the the panic button. In addition to its own The industry finally reopened April
economy shut when COVID-19 hit ports being shut down because of the 28, but by then a significant amount
the Land of the Long White Cloud. disease, it could not turn to the United of downstream damage had already
Who knew how bad it was going to States for alternatives because of the on- been done.
get? Like other countries, it drew up going trade war. “So, you have all these COVID-19 has made life difficult,
a list of essential services and indus- ships full of logs floating around with expensive, and often problematic for
tries, and forestry was not among nowhere to go,” says Lambert. those operating in the forestry sec-
them. There were almost immediate Eventually Chinese ports reopened, tor in BC, but as the example of New
repercussions, says Tyson Lambert and the logs that had been piled up at Zealand illustrates, it could have been
of T-Mar Industries on Vancouver ports like Tauranga on The Bay of Plenty worse if the industry had not been
Island, which designs and manufac- started flying off the dock and into the deemed essential.
tures steep-slope logging equipment, steady stream of ships coming to haul
about half of which is sold into New them away. However, there were no logs
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