I understand, but I'm talking about the past, two or three years ago. Let's take this out of the context of the conflict.
It's very difficult for people in the forest sector to get financial support from the federal government. I'm familiar with a lot of programs, including the investments in forest industry transformation program, or IFIT, but they're underfunded. A lot of people could apply, but very few are selected, so much so that the majority of people in the forest sector don't apply for the IFIT program because they think they'll be refused anyway.
I now want to come back to the issue of the tariff war with the United States. The $700-million loan is a good thing. This is the first time I've seen the federal government offer liquidity to the forest sector, but it's not much. Earlier, you said that $10 billion in anti-dumping and countervailing duties is currently sitting in the United States. I was told by people in the sector that we're now at $12 billion. So $12 billion is sitting in the United States, and $700 million is being offered to the industry. A Canadian company like Arbec has $300 million sitting in the United States. So if we want to support them, Arbec would have to swallow up almost half of the $700 million.
People in the forest sector tell us that this is not the type of program they need, as they don't need access to additional funding, they need market access. The best solution for market access may lie in what the forest industry people proposed this week, which is to reimburse them for part of the anti-dumping and countervailing duties. That wouldn't violate our trade agreements and the United States' interpretation of the forest sector, since that already exists. Hedge funds are already able to buy back the countervailing duties of certain companies that are being squeezed at very low prices.
Is the department looking at putting in place that type of program that could absorb some of the anti-dumping and countervailing duties?