Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  Yes. The value-for-wood program and the FPInnovations program are very good programs. As I said earlier, we'd like to see them on a longer basis than two years. It's hard to develop those kinds of programs. They take time, and if you don't know you have consistent funding, that's a problem.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  Mr. Thibeault, if I could interject here, I have been talking with the Forest Products Association of Canada about this issue. It is a recently emerging issue. The thought process we have right now is that the parliamentarians, the government, can approach the U.S. government to start the dialogue on the ramifications of this program, both from a trade aspect and from an environmental aspect.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  To your earlier question around structural versus cyclical difficulties, this speaks to the very issue you're talking about here. I'll give you an example. After the Kobe earthquake in Japan, which was probably about 50% of the market for the B.C. coast at that time, they changed their building systems there.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  We do very little business with the BDC. The forest industry, generally, in the commercial world, accesses EDC for offshore loan financial instruments. They're essential for doing that, so we don't have that problem there. The EDC is very important to us that way, by the way, because when you're sending product across you need letters of credit and that kind of thing to facilitate the commerce, and the EDC steps in.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  In today's marketplace and with the financial conditions the forest industry has been facing, R and D probably runs at around 1% to 1.5%. We are highly dependent on research and development from federal funding and provincial funding through FPInnovations, UBC, Laval, and places like that.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  If I could quickly add something, it doesn't help the demand side much, but the silviculture case that Mark made is a good one. We can put people to work, including our loggers and harvesters, if we look at investments in intensive silviculture today. And that's not planting the trees, so to speak, that's tending the trees.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  Mr. Garneau, I'd just like to add to that. Yes, indeed, we're finding that interest rates for our companies with good business plans and good balance sheets are north of 8%, 10%, and 12%. If you can even get credit, the coupon value on that credit is far above standard bank rates.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  That's a great question. British Columbia is leading the pack in this regard. Our premier, in the throne speech, promised a wood-first policy, and we are working on it. All public buildings built in British Columbia will have a requirement to use wood wherever possible. This is good from three perspectives: it increases demand; it increases demand outside the residential sector into the commercial and non-residential sectors; and it allows us to showcase the use of wood in these applications to our customers all across the world, including the United States.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  No, I'm in Victoria today.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  Thank you, Mr. Garneau. Yes, joint market efforts build the industry's road for the future, in British Columbia as well as across Canada. It should not be lost on us that our high dependence on the U.S. market left the forest industry very vulnerable. As Mr. Arsenault said, we were the bellwethers of this global recession.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  Okay, I have two more for you and we're done.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  We also need to improve hosting conditions, and that falls into the federal government purview. When we talk about hosting conditions, we talk about taxation policy, R and D, competitiveness, and innovation. There are things we can look at there. Finally, we have two issues in the United States right now: softwood lumber, and an alternative energy tax rebate.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. It's a pleasure to be in front of the committee here. Thank you for being cost-effective and allowing us to do this by video conference. I just got out of surgery yesterday, so I wouldn't have been able to make it otherwise, so my appreciation there. I'd first like to premise my remarks by saying the crisis in forestry here today is market-driven, and we should not lose sight of that fact.