Natural Resources Committee on Oct. 30th, 2025

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Duguid]

Give a quick answer of 30 seconds, Mr. Hargrove.

[Glenn Hargrove]

The $700 million is delivered through BDC. There are no regional carve-outs, but softwood lumber producers and manufacturers in Newfoundland would be eligible to access those loan guarantees through their financial institutions and through BDC.

[Jonathan Rowe, Conservative, Terra Nova—The Peninsulas, NL]

Thank you.

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Mr. Chair, I just want to clarify something. It's not the fault of the interpreters, who do a wonderful job. However, Canada does not export wood chips. What Mr. Hargrove said in English—wood pellets—was interpreted in French as “copeaux de bois”, which means wood chips, but “granules de bois” should have been used instead. I would just like to tell the analysts to use the word “granules” instead of “copeaux” if that ever appears in the notes. Ultimately, Canada does not export wood chips, but rather wood pellets.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Duguid]

Thanks for that clarification, Mr. Simard.

We're going to our last speaker for this round and for this hour.

Mr. Danko, you have five minutes.

[John-Paul Danko, Liberal, Hamilton West—Ancaster—Dundas, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I'm a structural engineer, and I love the wood code. It's my favourite thing to design things from wood, but it's often a challenge to convince clients to use wood versus traditional steel or concrete.

You talked about greening construction through wood, so I wanted to give you, first, a broad opportunity to talk about the place in the market in Canada for LVL, for mass timber or for other engineered wood products and where you see that in terms of what sector versus traditional sectional lumber. Is that a growth opportunity for value-added products in Canada?

[Glenn Hargrove]

Yes, I think it definitely is a growth area, and it provides opportunities for not only those firms that are producing those modular components and prefab solutions but also the primary sector that will produce products that go into that and the residues that go into those processes. I think it's a huge opportunity. Again, if Canada is going to work to double housing starts, we're going to need to do that in efficient ways. That includes these modular and prefab solutions.

There's also important work we need to do. You mentioned that they're considered to be a sort of higher risk, for lack of a better term. One thing that we're doing through that GCWood program is looking to have demonstration projects that show how these solutions can be implemented and, therefore, can help to de-risk those who follow suit.

We're looking at codes and standards. We're looking at market demand and reducing risk. We're working with Build Canada Homes on that demand side as well. We're also working on the R and D and the investment sides of things. We're trying to look at the whole value chain, in order to capitalize on that opportunity.

[John-Paul Danko, Liberal, Hamilton West—Ancaster—Dundas, ON]

You mentioned challenges with building codes. You previously mentioned Chinese and Japanese code requirements. Even within Canada, there are inconsistencies between the national building code and various provincial building codes when it comes to height restrictions, fire code restrictions and things like that.

What opportunity do you see for the federal government to take a leadership role in standardizing how wood products can be used across Canada and across the world?

[Glenn Hargrove]

There is a good opportunity there. We work with the National Research Council on national building codes and help to support that work. We fund research through FPInnovations, which helps support that and provides the evidence base for that codes and standards work.

As I mentioned, we do that internationally to help open those markets. There's a lot of opportunity. There's also work with the provincial and territorial governments in order to open up those opportunities more locally.

There's a lot of room, and there's an important role for the government to play because we're talking about codes, standards and the rules around construction. It's an area of focus for us.

[John-Paul Danko, Liberal, Hamilton West—Ancaster—Dundas, ON]

I think I have about a minute remaining.

I would like to give you the opportunity to add to or expand on anything else that has been part of this discussion. I'll turn the floor over to you.

[Glenn Hargrove]

Thanks. I appreciate that.

I would like to speak to the two billion trees program, if I may. I didn't get an opportunity to respond to that.

The notion that the federal government is years and years behind on that goal assumes that the trajectory for that program is linear, and it's not. It takes about three years to go from the planning stage, the seedling and the nursery to planting a tree. When you launch a program like this, it's not a linear process. It's like a hockey stick.

We're focusing on long-term agreements. We now have commitments for about a billion, which is half the target. We're continuing to work with the provinces and territories that need to plant the majority of the trees. We're continuing to work on those long-term agreements. We're continuing to get those commitments, and we're ramping things up over time.

[John-Paul Danko, Liberal, Hamilton West—Ancaster—Dundas, ON]

Engineers understand the difference between linear and logarithmic growth. If my colleagues would like a math lesson, I'm happy to help them out.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Duguid]

Thank you, Mr. Danko. Your time is up.

Colleagues, on your behalf, I thank Mr. Smith and Mr. Hargrove for coming to see us today. It's been a very informative hour.

As the analyst just reminded me, a background report is coming. It will be available next....

[Laura Carter, Committee Researcher]

It will be available on Friday afternoon, in preparation for Monday afternoon's meeting.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Duguid]

Excellent. That will give us further background. We got some great background today from NRCAN, and we'll be more fully informed.

We're at the top of the hour, so we are going to suspend while we switch over to in camera.

I see Mr. McKinnon on a point of order.

[Ron McKinnon, Liberal, Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you.

I wonder if we could suggest to the witnesses that if they wish to follow up with a brief, it would be appreciated.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Duguid]

That is a welcome suggestion.

Mr. Hargrove and Mr. Smith, we would welcome a brief. We have your speaking notes on the record, but a more fulsome brief would be terrific.

I think we'll get some of that in the background report as well.

We will suspend while we switch to in camera.

[Proceedings continue in camera]