Limestone Partners Jib Turner and Andrew Ault collectively argue Ontario’s forest sector is not competitive globally because of excessive government red tape. The Forest sector needs to lobby government for significant changes.
Ontario’s Forests: Open For Business
Ontario Premier Doug Ford acknowledges “the forestry sector contributes $15.3 billion to Ontario’s economy. That’s more than 150,000 good jobs across rural and northern Ontario.”1 While the forest industry has hit a beating in recent times, well-known ecologist Patrick Moore (PhD, UBC) proclaims “trees are the answer”2 to many of our sustainability problems in the future. As the main ingredient to plastic is oil, the use of fossil fuels spans far beyond energy as a green, sustainable and renewable resource. Given exciting growth potential beyond pulp and paper, it is important that Ontario establish itself as a hub for value-added forest products and forest innovation; as well as a leading exporter of wood. To become this, however, it is quintessential to understand how Ontario’s public forests can better compete and best utilize its wood capacity to truly become open for business.
Background
Ontario’s Crown Forests
The people of Ontario depend the forests to benefit the Province environmentally, economically and socially. The Crown forests in Ontario are managed by the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry (MNRF.)3 Based on the latest MNRF’s State of Ontario’s Forests report,4 completed in 2016, Ontario has 43 million hectares of managed crown forests and an average of 1,400 hectares were afforested annually with only 470 hectares deforested per year, from 2009-2013. These forests, owned by the crown, are managed by holders of a Sustainable Forest License, which are given as per Management Unit boundaries.5 Each management unit has its own management plan, dictating the silviculture work on the site. Inventories are also taken of trees to predict capacity. The crown charges stumpage, and fees for silviculture work on a per- tree basis that are paid to two trust funds: the Forestry Futures Fund and the Forest Sustainability Fund. These pay contractors for their silviculture work in restoring the forest. This contrasts with private forests, who manage the forests themselves per their own guidelines.
The Forest Industry in Ontario
The forest industry creates on average 51,660 direct jobs, not to mention the indirect jobs the industry creates as a result. While the employment in the forest industry has declined from 2006 to 2011 and there have been many layoffs in the sector, some suggest it will continue to rebound.6 In recent years between 2004 and 2008 there was 33% more jobs in the forest industry. The decline of the forest industry is in part due to the high Canadian dollar and the housing market crash in the United States.7 Many pulp and paper mills have been shut down, and some have attempted to convert to produce other products. To this extent, the province invests in R and D funding through a range of programs under FP Innovations.
Forestry continues to play a big role in northern and rural economies. While the number of forest-reliant communities continues to decline,8 Ontario maintains well its position in the 7-8% range as a percentage of Canadian wood exports, and is consistent in its value-added exports accounting for roughly 1/3rd of all value-added wood product exports in Canada.9 With investment in the bio-economy, as seen through the Forest Industry Division of the MNRF, investments in FPInnovations and the creation of the Centre for Research in the Bioeconomy (CRIBE), the Ontario government is quickly seeing the threes in the forest and realizing the potential of a knowledge-intensive bioeconomy.
Utilization
The forests in Ontario are not being optimally utilized. From 2009 to 2013, there were 71 million hectares of forest, 43 million hectares of which were managed Crown forest area. On average 1.84 million hectares of forest were damaged due to natural weather disturbances, insects and diseases, and forest fires or harvest annually each year. Some state this equates to 71 hectares of forest not being utilized.10 While the MNRF sets a theoretical harvest volume per year, this is also based on old forest inventories. Per Ian Dunn, Chief Economist of the Ontario Forest Industry Association, these predictions generally boil down the number to roughly 25 million cubic meters of overall capacity.11 It is believed the annual average harvested area remains under 40% of the permitted area each year.12
Often of times, Ontario is compared to Finland to see how underutilized our forests are, in a comparative perspective. The forest industry in Finland differs drastically from that of Ontario. Finland is a mere 0.3 million km2, compared to Ontario at 100 million km2. Despite their smaller size, Finland is able to surpass the 15 million cubic meters that Ontario harvests by harvesting 60 million cubic meters in 2016. There are some drastic differences in the way the forests are managed in both places. Forests in Finland are privately owned for the most part (60%), compared to in Ontario where very little of the forests are privately owned (6%). The raw forest products that come from family owned forests in Finland make up (80%),13 compared to in Ontario where no forest products are from family owned forests. There is also a substantial difference when the private sector is responsible for the deforestation and afforestation and in Finland there is a positive impact on the forest sector when the forests are privately owned.14 In 2014 the forest industry contributed $12 billion to the Ontario economy. In 2014 Ontario exported $5.2 billion of forest products. Considering the fact that Ontario is only harvesting 40% of the allowable forest, there is room for substantial growth in the industry. The forest sector should be able to contribute much more to the Ontario economy and exports and benefit the province in many facets.
The clear problem is that, there needs to be a significant study in understanding why Ontario’s forests are significantly more underutilized than Finland’s. It also points to opportunity for forest companies to move towards knowledge-based forest innovations.
-Andrew Ault, MBA, MSc [C]
Partner, Limestone Partners
Problem Statement
Given the industrial projection, how can Ontario cut red tape and address important infrastructure barriers; to strengthen its harvest volume and make its forests open for business?
Ontario obviously has huge potential in its forest business. However, it has difficulty in realizing this. While market and non-market forces are likely both at play, this paper digs into the underlying internal causes of underutilization, through a public policy perspective. It particularly is concerned with trying to discern what will likely happen to the industry should trends stay the same, analyzing to what extent building infrastructure may spur industrial growth and how current policy decisions should be managed going forward. It concludes with a recommendation, geared to the Government of Ontario.
How competitive are Ontario’s Forests, anyways?
Using a logarithmic regression, it can be projected that, by 2025 Ontario would only harvest 28% of its capacity.
Ontario continues to decline in its harvest volumes each year. (see Figure 1)We projected linearly, in 2025 Ontario would harvest a dismal 6 million m3. Ontario is consistent with about 34-35% share of value-added forest products in Canada, however. Figure 2 best illustrates underutilization, namely in the form of showing a declining utilization percentage of overall forest volumes.
While it has rebounded from the early recession, and is now flat, there does not appear to be any spikes and hence would likely remain relatively flat if not declining. For illustrative purposes, we project, based on the trend, that it will continue to shrink; however these results are limited as they take into account data from the recession. A more comprehensive multivariate analysis would be needed to make any conclusive prediction. Nevertheless, there is clear underutilization which is continuing. This is notably not likely solely caused by industrial constraints. While declining surplus is often cited as a major concern for why Ontario is harvesting less trees, it is important to note its margin remains relatively flat surplus fluctuates (as a function of capacity); implying the problem may not be in industry margins, but rather in policy and regulations.
Implications:
While the Finnish comparison may exaggerate the difference between harvest and area, clearly Ontario is producing less wood than it should both, in terms of quantity, and as a percentage of theoretical allowance. Since 2002, it decreased from 70% to the mid-40s. As there is reasonable consistency in metrics on natural disturbances and climate change (Ontario, 2019), as well as consistent margin as shown above (despite often-cited changes in surplus) – policy ought to be considered as a major driver of change (along with other social and environmental factors). To this extent, we examined forest access roads as a major cause limiting marketable allowance.
To what extent do forestry roads and government infrastructure facilitate harvest volumes?
While funding decreased from 2006-12 to 2013-16, so too did the average primary and branch roads (the ones qualifying for funding). There is a near perfect correlation between harvest volume and all roads, and a somewhat significant strong correlation between primary/branch roads being established and harvest volume. The latter is important, as primary and branch roads are those funded by government, hence are infrastructure.
As the province incurs 100% of the maintenance costs of primary roads and 50% for branch roads, such can be stated as infrastructure. There is a strong though not significant relationship between primary/secondary infrastructure road network in any given year and harvest volume. This is important as, should significance improve with a larger sample, it could support the idea that road infrastructure is needed for growth.
IMPLICATIONS
The analysis supports the postulation that infrastructure, particularly in terms of forest access roads, is strongly related to harvest volumes and capacity. While there is an obvious and near perfect relationship between road construction and harvest volume; when considering infrastructure as primary/branch roads (funded by government), there is a strong relationship with harvest volum. This, along with the relationship between road construction and harvest volume, would suggest investment in primary/secondary roads does have impact on realizable capacity, and should be an area of focus. It is noted Finland has an exceptional road network.
What concerns are on the horizon for Ontario’s forest sector?
Caribou are an endangered species in Canada. The government is considering three options to become compliant:
Caribou 1 is baseline compliance
Caribou 2 is baseline + 30 year disturbance target; and
Caribou 3 is baseline + 50 year disturbance target.
MNRF data was visualized to gauge its impact on northern Forest Management Units. The visualization above specifies SPF from all wood to best capture its impact on Ontario Wood exports; while the below colour-coded chart shows the impacts of each scenario in economic terms as a side-by-side comparison vis-à-vis Ministry of Finance reports.
How should the forest industry respond?
Lobby Government to create a Provincial Strategy to identify and cut red tape, such as duplication of ESA and CFSA, stumpage and energy considerations including carbon taxes to promote optimal achievement of forest operations.
Lobby government to restore the additional $5 million each year for the next 3 years to the Forest Access Roads program. Assess each year to ensure additional tax revenue from increased operations should exceed funding.
Lobby government to Implement only baseline, absolutely mandatory caribou legislation to best balance sustainability and industry.