Environment committee  Thank you, Madam Chair and members of the committee. Copies of my remarks are available in English for people after the session is over. My name is Robert Larocque. I'm very pleased to be here to represent the Forest Products Association of Canada as part of your review of the C

Environment committee  Yes, I think there are a couple of examples. For example, better co-operation between the provinces and the federal government could improve enforcement. I think too many times legislation is done where it could be confusing, in that the test methods are not exactly the same as t

Environment committee  I completely agree with that. I think my point was not to go completely over, only on the hazard side of it. Maybe it's my view of the word “hazard”, but when you are making pulp and paper or tissue or toilet paper, you do use hazardous substances, like bleaching, for example. We

Environment committee  I completely agree. The standing committee looking at all this is not going to be.... We're following it. I totally agree with you. The uncertainty would happen if there were significant changes to CEPA. Sometimes there's an uncertainty on how it would be implemented following th

Environment committee  Exactly.

Environment committee  Yes, sure. One of the latest examples we have was the latest multi-sector air pollutant regulation that came out, where some, for example, testing done under the provincial government may not be accepted under federal regulation, so now we're going to have to go back and retest,

Environment committee  Exactly.

Environment committee  I do believe that the risk-based approach is working well. I understand that bioaccumulation is something that needs to be looked at.

Environment committee  Without knowing exactly what that means, if it could be improved, yes.

Natural Resources committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair, and members of the committee. I have provided copies of my remarks around the table if you need them. My opening remarks will be bilingual, so I'll be flipping back and forth from French to English if that's okay. My name is Robert Larocque, and I am the se

Natural Resources committee  I think you're right. During the economic crisis of 2008 to 2010 we saw a lot of the changes that happened to our sector, and we lost about a third of the sector. The electronic age also came around. The pulping sector and the lumber side outside of trade disputes is doing well.

Natural Resources committee  That's in total revenue.

Natural Resources committee  They're both accurate. It's just a different way of looking at the economic impacts. One is based on gross domestic product, which is the $23 billion. Sixty-seven billion dollars is also from Stats Canada, and it's the total revenue of the products made in 2016. It's a different

Natural Resources committee  Absolutely. Our number one concern is on climate change impact on the forests. It's the trees. We also deal with the pine beetle out west. Initially we were able to salvage some of the trees that were impacted by pests. Now we're seeing the total effect on the trees that were rep

Natural Resources committee  Very quickly, when there is a trade dispute like the one we're seeing, and we have to put 20% to 25% of tariffs on the side, that's money that the industry cannot pass over. We've been lucky so far that the price of wood in the United States has increased, but that also means it'