Saskatchewan benefiting from new developments in forestry

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Lumber prices might be low right now, but they don't seem to be having a major impact on the number of investments being made in the forestry sector in Saskatchewan.

"Overall, over the last couple or three years, we've had probably a lot more investment in the Saskatchewan forest sector than in a lot of other parts of Canada," said Val Nicholson, who handles communications for the Saskatchewan Environment and Resource Management (SERM) Forest Economic Development Team. "So we're sitting with actually one of the more modern and efficient industries in the country probably right now-I can say that without fear of contradiction- maybe even North America.

A number of new developments are just beginning operations, including two new projects being developed by Weyerhaueser.

"We've got a couple of facilities that are, new facilities that are coming on line in Saskatchewan," said Wayne Roznowsky, who does public affairs for Weyerhaueser in Prince Albert.

"We just got a new OSB (oriented strand board) mill in Hudson Bay that came on line in December, and we're working to have it wrapped up later this year to full production. That mill will produce about 570 million square feet of oriented strand board."

"It's one of the newest mills in North America," Roznowsky said of the $200 million project. In addition to being a state of the art facility, the mill is also the biggest structure in Saskatchewan in terms of square feet.

Another new Weyerhaueser project about to come online is a new sawmill in Big River.

"We had had a sawmill there since Weyerhaueser came to Saskatchewan in '86. However, we built a new mill that's just been completed this year, and that will be about a $90 million project, and that mill has a capacity of about 240 million board feet a year of lumber. Just to put that into perspective, the old mill that was in Big River had a capacity of 90 million board feet. So this is quite a bit larger," Roznowksy said. The sawmill should be operational early this month.

Other recent investments by Weyerhaeuser included $300 million in improvements to its pulp and paper mill in Prince Albert.

"It had two components. One was to clean up our air emissions, and the other was to start burning more waste wood- bark, sawdust, that type of thing -to replace purchases of electricity and natural gas."

In addition to its various new facilities, Weyerhaueser can also boast about another new development. The company's environmental management systems for its forest operations have just been certified to ISO 14001 standards.

"That's a third-party verification of our system. And what that does, it allows us to have standard procedures and practices in our forestry operations. So we're doing the same thing the same way every time. And that's an important step toward going towards third-party certification of our forestry practices. First we have to put the environmental management system in place. Then you take the next step toward third-party certification, whether it's to the CSA standard or Forest Stewardship Council. So that's a pretty important step as well, and that just happened. We just learned in early April that we had passed our audit," Roznowsky said.

Things are also going well with Wapawekka Lumber, a sawmill jointly owned by Lac La Ronge Indian Band, Montreal Lake Cree Nation, Peter Ballantyne Cree Nation, and Weyerhaueser.

"Wapawekka, the sawmill and the operations, are going really well. It's a good mill and a really successful work system. It's being hurt by low lumber prices, as is everybody in the industry," Roznowsky said.

The Wapawekka mill, located adjacent to the pulp mill in Prince Albert, has been operating for about a year.

"It's a very efficient small log mill that they're able to utilize wood that would otherwise, to make 2 x 4s out of it, that might otherwise have gone through the chipper and gone in the pulp mill. So it's creating a higher value product out of a resource that would have oherwise gone to chips. Plus the chips then can go to the pulp mill. So everything's used," said Nicholson.

Although the Wapawekka project is probably the most high-profile example, involvement of First Nations in Weyerhaueser goes beyond the partnership in the sawmill.

"There are both First Nations employees and First Nations business in forestry. And that's all aspects from harvesting to silviculture to transportation," Roznowsky said.

"And also what we do have is some definite program and goals to increase the number of Aboriginal people working at our mills. We have an employment equity program that's been approved by the Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission, which allows us to try to encourage and develop employment that matches the demographics of our community. And in some of our communities, there are a lot of Aboriginal, First Nations people. Our facilities, unfortunately, aren't there yet," he said, adding one of the factors hampering the company's efforts is the low turnover rate among its workforce.

"But we are, through a number of programs, trying to develop that work force. For example, we have bursary programs that are aimed at Aboriginal people, both technical and university bursary programs. We spend a lot of time at career days and going to schools to explain to people what's required to work at one of our facilities-the skills you need, the classes you need. I think you really need to start, in some cases, talking to people in Grade 7, 8 and 9, so that they understand, you know, you need Grade 12, you need this technical program. So we're working there," he said.

"But I do know that when we were doing hiring for both Hudson Bay and Big River, we actually made a special effort to talk to the First Nations in the areas, explain to them what was happening."

"The whole focus for the expansion of the forest industry," Nicholson explained, "is the government of the day here has decided that for their policy on forest expansion, they want to ensre that it's done first and foremost, sustainably, and in the best way possible for the health of the ecosystem. That's first. And that companies coming in here have to ensure that they involve and that there's participation from northern and First Nations communities. And that's been a principle that they've been sticking to for the last couple of years. And it's working out well."