Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, committee members.
The OFIA represents 55 member companies that make forestry products and sustainably manage 27 million hectares of public forest in Ontario, contributing $5.4 billion in provincial GDP and supporting 128,000 direct and indirect jobs.
I'm going to leave you with four key messages today. Number one, we continue to experience an evolution and consolidation of the North American pulp and paper sector. In 2005 there were 16 pulp and paper mills in Ontario. There are currently three operating. In the last two years alone, we have seen the closure of a containerboard facility in Trenton, Ontario, affecting 150 jobs; the closure of the Espanola pulp and paper mill, the largest employer in town, affecting 450 jobs; and the continued idling of the Terrace Bay pulp mill, impacting 400 workers. In 2003 there were 103,000 people directly employed in paper manufacturing across Canada, and today that number is 46,000.
Message number two is that lumber producers are facing unprecedented challenges. The forestry sector is highly integrated: Sawdust, woodchips and bark produced at sawmills become the feedstock for pulp and paper mills and bioenergy facilities. With the consolidation of the pulp and paper sector, this market has shrunk dramatically, leading to this material being stockpiled, landfilled or shipped further away, adding additional costs to lumber producers at a time when they simply cannot stand it. In addition, homebuilding markets on both sides of the border—