Ellen Engstedt - June 04, 2007
Montana Wood Products Association
Timber Supply
Timber sold from Montana’s national forest lands in 1992 was just over 400 million board feet with a like amount harvested. Conversely, in 2006 national forest land timber sold in Montana was one-quarter of that amount at about 100 million board feet. In order to operate at the most efficient capacity the current Montana timber infrastructure requires about 700 million board feet annually to sustain all operations.
Timber land ownership is divided with national forests at over 60 percent; non industrial private 20 percent; State of Montana four percent; BLM four percent; forest industry eight percent; and, tribal four percent. The percentages of land harvested versus ownership are vastly the opposite when it comes to those lands managed by the Forest Service with over 60 percent ownership and less than 14 percent harvest. U. S. Forest Service information indicates the amount of timber volume under appeals and litigation in Montana alone is over 335 million board feet. This accounts for the millions of acres of once beautiful Montana forests in unhealthy and dangerous condition due to overcrowding, bugs and disease.
This also accounts for the loss of Montana mills, loggers and jobs for hard working families. The issue of log supply, or rather lack thereof, came home to roost again in the past couple of weeks with the announcement by Stimson Lumber Company of the imminent closure of its plywood plant at Bonner. One hundred thirty three Montana families will be affected by this decision for closure.
There are a varied number of issues connected with any curtailment or closure of a timber manufacturing entity, but the key element is always log supply. In the early 1990s timber volume sold from national forests began a downward spiral and the graph upward of closing mills began. Since 1990 Montana has lost 23 mills during a time in the United States of ever-increasing consumption of wood products. Even though our country could readily supply the citizens’ needs through sustainable forestry, 35 percent of the wood consumed comes from Canada shipped into the U. S. across the Montana border onto rail cars which then pass by Montana mills causing a glut of lumber and driving prices down.
We have on suitable federal timber land a combined growth and mortality of a billion and a half board feet per year. We easily could harvest 500 million board feet annually in a completely sustainable manner. Low market prices could be offset with lower stumpage prices and more available fiber, but with the shortage of federal timber sale logs, stumpage prices are too high for many mills to compete and the losses become too great.
Montana’s wood products infrastructure is integrated which means each facility depends upon the others. There are stud mills, particleboard plants, a pulp mill, post and pole operations, and specialty mills to name a few. Some of the facilities such as Smurfit-Stone Container and Roseburg Forest Products are residual operations and they need healthy sawmills producing lumber in order to obtain the materials needed to produce other value added products like particleboard and paper.
A lot of noise has been made about what should happen in the wildland urban interface where thousands of houses have been built and people live. It is not enough to clear brush and small trees a few feet from structures and expect them to be fire safe.
The enormous overload of fuel in the forests far from houses will build the catastrophic situations Montana residents have faced nearly every year for almost a decade. Last year, 2006, nearly one million acres of Montana land was lost to wildfire and with the continued lack of management on federal lands there is no reason to think history will not continue to repeat itself. The future result of loss of clean air, clean water, and safe wildlife habitat will be directly linked to countless appeals and litigation by those in the conflict industry who continue to stop much needed active forest management.
Unless land managers and Montana citizens collectively rise up to stop the serial litigators in their tracks, Montana will go the way of many western states with little to no available timber infrastructure to address the forest health dilemma we have allowed to occur by actions of the shrill few. And, yes, a huge part of the solution is increased log supply from Montana’s national forests and time is of the essence.
On behalf of the Montana Wood Products Association based in Helena, I am
Ellen Engstedt. Thanks for listening.
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