Close X
Monday, November 25, 2024
ADVT 
National

Let's make a deal, Canada urges U.S. amid latest 'baseless' softwood lumber duties

Darpan News Desk The Canadian Press, 27 Jul, 2023 04:54 PM
  • Let's make a deal, Canada urges U.S. amid latest 'baseless' softwood lumber duties

Canada is urging the United States to make a good-faith effort at negotiating an end to the interminable bilateral dispute over softwood lumber. 

International Trade Minister Mary Ng is making the overture after a fresh U.S. Commerce Department review maintained duties on softwood imports from Canada.

Ng says the duties, while modestly lower, remain an unfair, baseless and punitive measure that hurts the economy on both sides of the border. 

She says a negotiated settlement is the only way the two countries will ever fully resolve the decades-old dispute. 

Such a deal is unlikely: the U.S. has a fundamental problem with a regulatory regime in Canada that it says puts American producers at a disadvantage. 

U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai has said the U.S. would be willing to negotiate, but only if Canada does away with its provincial stumpage fee system. 

"An immediate negotiated solution to this long-standing trade issue is in the best interests of both our countries," Ng said in a statement.

"Canada is disappointed that the United States is not meaningfully engaging in discussions on a return to predictable cross-border trade in softwood lumber." 

The Commerce Department established a combined "all others" duty rate of 7.99 per cent, only slightly less than the 8.59 per cent established after the last administrative review. 

Ottawa, meanwhile, will keep up the fight through the dispute resolution tools in the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, the World Trade Organization and the courts in the U.S., Ng said. 

"The only fair outcome would be for the United States to cease applying these baseless duties." 

In Canada, lumber-producing provinces set so-called stumpage fees for timber harvested from Crown land — a system that U.S. producers, forced to pay market rates, say amounts to an unfair subsidy.

Federal officials in Ottawa have said Canada would never agree to implement such a fundamental change to the way a key Crown resource is managed before the two sides have even sat down.

 

MORE National ARTICLES

B.C. residents urged to conserve water as worsening drought conditions parch province

B.C. residents urged to conserve water as worsening drought conditions parch province
Emergency Management and Climate Readiness Minister Bowinn Ma called on residents, farmers, businesspeople and industrial plant operators to take urgent steps to cut water use. 

B.C. residents urged to conserve water as worsening drought conditions parch province

Facebook rental scams: Surrey RCMP

Facebook rental scams: Surrey RCMP
Mounties say scammers advertise a property and explain that a deposit is required to secure the property due to high demand. Communication with the renter usually ends once an e-transfer of funds is sent and without the rental property being seen.

Facebook rental scams: Surrey RCMP

Vehicle crashes into Surrey home

Vehicle crashes into Surrey home
 The driver, a 21-year-old man, was arrested for Dangerous Operation of a Motor Vehicle and Flight from Police. He was treated on scene for minor injuries and released to appear in court at a later date.  Speed and dangerous driving were contributing factors in the collision. 

Vehicle crashes into Surrey home

Missing person to locate Robanpreet Singh

Missing person to locate Robanpreet Singh
Robanpreet was last seen on July 9, 2023 at his residence in Surrey. Police and family are concerned for Robanpreet’s health and well-being as it is out of character for Robanpreet to be out of contact for this long. If you see Robanpreet, keep him in sight and call police.

Missing person to locate Robanpreet Singh

B.C. expected to request Ottawa's help with worsening wildfires: minister

B.C. expected to request Ottawa's help with worsening wildfires: minister
Bill Blair tells The Canadian Press the government operations centre has been in discussions with the province for the last several days, and Ottawa is ready to deploy needed resources as the formal request for help is expected Thursday.

B.C. expected to request Ottawa's help with worsening wildfires: minister

BC man gets 9 years for shooting

BC man gets 9 years for shooting
A B-C man has been sentenced to nine years in prison for fatally shooting a woman in Surrey two years ago, and for an unrelated robbery two months earlier. The 26-year-old pleaded guilty to manslaughter for killing a 20-year-old sex worker in May 2021, and to a robbery and a weapons charge for holding up a poker game in Burnaby in March that same year.

BC man gets 9 years for shooting