British Columbia Premier David Eby spent five days in January visiting four major cities in India.  The “Looking West” junket was primarily designed to remind potential customers that B.C. was open for business, and boost interest in the province’s critical minerals and forest products.

Too bad he didn’t stay at home in Victoria from the forest products perspective. He could have used the time to make some much-needed and long-suggested positive changes. The provincial government has the power to make policy adjustments that would help the ailing provincial forest industry—now—when it is most needed.

Instead, the status quo remains and the perfect storm rages on.

The elements contributing to it have long been forecast. They have combined to topple Canada from the lowest cost lumber producer in North America to the highest. The dubious statistic will persist with provincial government inertia and U.S. President Donald Trump’s 45 per cent tariff on Canadian softwood lumber entering America.

In a rare show of unanimity, the province’s forest industry associations are aligned in urging the provincial NDP government to help save the industry from further structural decay. They’re trying to convince it of the urgency of the situation and the growing implications of further delay to the social and financial fabric of the province—nothing’s happened, apart from a five-day trade mission with a token nod to forestry.

The idea of creating new markets for forest products is tossed around like buying a new outfit for spring. Alas, it’s not that simple and much more complicated and time consuming. Look at the long-term approach adopted by the federal and provincial governments along with forest industry representatives to develop the potential of the Japanese market for Canadian wood products. The diligent and consistent approach has paid dividends and Japan has become a vital market for several forest companies in B.C. and across Canada. But it’s been 30-odd years to get to this point.

Focused trade missions are an important long-term step toward the development of new markets. But B.C.’s forest industry needs help—again, now—and it shows no sign of being forthcoming from the provincial government. Urgent times require urgent measures. Advertising could be one of them.

The very word is an anathema to most in the industry. For decades in B.C. the forest industry was king. It generated much of the province’s wealth and the big forest industry barons largely dictated provincial land policy. Along the way, the industry became smug and self assured, confident in the seemingly never-ending natural resource that would sustain it and its influence. The last thing it did—or thought of—was to explain its actions.

Things have changed. The forests are no longer never ending: other constituents have demanded their fair share of B.C.’s publicly owned forests. First Nations have claimed and received primary access to about 20 per cent of them. The warming climate continues to erode B.C.s forests through pervasive insect infestations and more violent and unpredictable wildfires.

Even today, a minority of forest companies in receipt of publicly funded grants to help them get by during today’s tough times are reluctant to disclose their plans. “We prefer to operate under the radar,” they explain conspiratorially. Well, that’s working out really well. B. C’s forest industry is now off the government’s radar altogether and it’s partly due to that type of antediluvian perspective.

And somewhere along the line, the industry has lost any significant level of public support it may have had. The general public in B.C. seem to view the forest industry as yesterday’s story, a dying industry, no longer relevant in a world dominated by digital dialogue. The level of public ignorance about today’s forestry is due largely to yesterday’s industry and the reluctance of the present version to stand up and tell its story.

It’s past time for the Canadian forest industry generally and B.C.’s in particular to blow its own horn boldly and loudly. It’s time to remind existing markets and inform potential new ones that Canada manufactures the world’s highest quality wood products with the lowest environmental footprint. A consistent and focused campaign would help get that message out.

It might also give cause for Premier Eby to re-evaluate his doomsday attitude. All those forest industry associations are not expecting Victoria to take on the tariff war. They want Eby to take a closer and cost-minded look at his own government’s procedures and regulations.

And then make some surgical adjustments to streamline them. Right now, it routinely takes many months to navigate jurisdictional overlaps and government constipation to issue a cutting permit. Meanwhile, consider the downstream consequences. Loggers can’t harvest timber, truckers can’t transport it, sawmills can’t operate efficiently or at all, local and regional businesses experience slumping sales, people across small town and rural B.C. can’t afford to pay their bills—so the avalanche of consequences, suffering and upheaval keeps rolling.

B.C. is deeply in debt. The numbers are numbing for most workers. The members of those forest industry associations seeking to tell the premier their perspectives aren’t after money, just a civil hearing and a quick and positive reaction.

After all, the forest industry even in its diluted condition, continues to annually pump huge amounts of money into the provincial government’s coffers to fund the province’s social programs like health, education and infrastructure.

All that’s required is for David Eby to do is his job so the forest industry can get on with theirs.