Domtar will reopen its Howe Sound Pulp and Paper mill in Port Mellon, British Columbia, six weeks after announcing an indefinite shutdown, following a deal the provincial government brokered with the company. The restart, expected later this month, still hinges on Unifor Local 1119 members approving a new contract next week.
Unifor announced the agreement in principle on October 1, saying the breakthrough followed sustained pressure from its members and union leaders in recent weeks. National president Lana Payne called it “terrific news for our members and the whole community on the Sunshine Coast.”
Domtar wanted steadier, cheaper access to BC wood fibre, lighter regulatory costs, and electricity pricing for its cogeneration plant on par with other Canadian biomass producers. Ravi Parmar, BC’s Minister of Forests, in turn pushed for job guarantees, a promise to keep the facility running, and a commitment to revisit the industry’s broader structure if pulp prices don’t recover.
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The mill and its adjoining Bayview Fibre chipping facility were set to go fully dark by October 19, under the indefinite idling Domtar announced on August 20. The company blamed soft demand out of Asia, pulp prices that have stayed weak for years, and a tightening supply of affordable fibre, after pouring close to $500 million into the mill since buying it in 2010. About 400 people worked there directly. Parmar called the jobs “livelihoods that have supported families and communities for generations.”
The province appointed two negotiators on September 4 to work the file — Don Wright, a former deputy minister to the premier and head of the BC public service, and Don Kayne, Canfor’s former president and chief executive.
Howe Sound is the first of three recent BC pulp mill crises to end this way. Domtar’s own Crofton mill closed permanently last December, eliminating 350 jobs. Canfor’s Northwood mill in Prince George followed in July, cutting 300 more. Between them, the two permanent closures erased roughly 680,000 tonnes of annual northern bleached softwood kraft pulp capacity that isn’t coming back.
Related: Domtar To Permanently Close Crofton Pulp Mill, 350 Jobs Lost
Sawmills generate the wood chips that pulp mills turn into pulp, and a pulp mill is often the only buyer willing to take that leftover material off a sawmill’s hands, so losing either side of that trade strains the other. BC’s forestry coalition has also pointed to US tariffs of 50% on pulp and paper and 45% on softwood lumber, layered on top of pulp prices already near a century low.
Related: BC’s Forest Industry Wants A Crisis Team In The Premier’s Office Within 30 Days
The ratification vote is still a week away, and Parmar’s own comments left open whether this is a lasting fix or a reprieve before a larger reckoning over the industry’s future.
