A scene from a new Hollywood film satirizes the long-running trade dispute between Canada and the United States over softwood lumber, highlighting the persistent Canadian desire to remove trade barriers and the powerful U.S. lobbying efforts to maintain them.
Viewed through the lens of cross-border trade, a film scene underscores the persistence of the Canadian government wanting to dance with its protectionist southern neighbour. But the powerful U.S. government holds the upper hand in the bilateral trade dispute over softwood lumber.
While the battle has featured complex and arcane legal arguments by both sides, a simpler explanation of the long-running fight comes from an unlikely source: Hollywood fiction, which stars Canadian actor Seth Rogen, who is also the movie’s co-producer. In the film, Charlize Theron plays U.S. Secretary of State Charlotte Field, and actor Alexander Skarsgard plays Canadian Prime Minister James Steward. Ms. Theron’s American character views Mr. Skarsgard’s Canadian character as predictable, and she mockingly delivers the punchline: “Let me guess: You want fewer restrictions on lumber.” In real life, Canadian lumber producers are still predictably seeking to remove trade barriers in the softwood fight, which dates back to the early 1980s. But the influential U.S. Lumber Coalition has been an effective lobby group over the decades, winning political backing from federal U.S. senators and members of the House of Representatives who are keen to protect sawmill jobs in rural areas in softwood-producing states. restrictions on Canadian sales of softwood to American buyers. The United States believes that the measures are necessary to protect its lumber industry, because Canadian forests are mostly on public land, where buyers pay “stumpage fees” to provincial governments for the right to log. Washington argues those fees are too low and give Canadian loggers a competitive advantage over U.S. producers, which harvest timber largely from private lands and bid against each other for the privilege. The U.S. Department of Commerce is expected to release its next preliminary duty rates on lumber in early May, or 90 days later than originally planne
TRADE DISPUTE LUMBER CANADA UNITED STATES PROTECTIONISM
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