Take green construction, for example. In this construction system, the amount of intrinsic energy is decreased to reduce the impact and, above all, to create a very energy efficient building.
The United Nations Environment Programme includes a component on construction standards within the climate change initiative. As far as I know, Canada is virtually absent from the negotiations, while it should be very sensitive to this in order to develop the same kind of construction standards here.
In recent years, we have focused a lot on examples. If we favour wood construction, people in the aluminum, plaster or other industries immediately rear their heads and say that wood construction is not better than the others. I think we need to have an operations framework, as well as environmental and performance standards that will force our manufacturers to provide the best product at a competitive price.
Unlike the Scandinavians, we haven't developed any skill in design and architecture to produce the best wood products that are good, environmentally. Wood has an advantage, and it isn't at the political level that we'll make that advantage known. Rather, we need to put it in competition with other materials. We need to offer competitive wood products, in other words “cheap and cheerful”.
I think that we could develop typically Canadian products by drawing on the United Nations Environment Programme's construction standards within the climate change initiative. This would enable visionaries of the Canadian forestry industry to hold a much greater place than they currently do, particularly when it comes to institutional construction.