Wood products producers are encouraged by the Trudeau government’s decision to sign the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the first step to ratifying a sweeping agreement with Japan, Australia and other Asian countries. International Trade Minister Christia Freeland said this week she will take the next “technical step,” allowing the TPP to be debated in the House of…

Catalyst Paper  announced today that it has been served with two Notices of Civil Claim by the Halalt First Nation and its business partners. Catalyst denies the allegations contained in both claims and intends to vigorously defend itself. The first claim was filed by the Halalt and its members alleging Catalyst has illegally trespassed on, and…

Northern Pulp pleaded guilty Wednesday to a charge under the federal Fisheries Act stemming from a 2014 effluent spill. Lawyers for the federal Environment Department and the mill arrived at Pictou provincial court with an agreed statement of facts and prepared to enter the plea and seek a sentence from Judge Del Atwood. However, Atwood…

In April this year, the Tla’amin First Nation will officially become a self-governing nation under a new treaty that will roughly quadruple its land base, grant new forest tenures and shellfish leases and provide $29 million in cash and $11 million in economic development funds.  All of which means new economic development opportunities for the…

Nova Scotia Power is defending the suite of rates and tariffs it wants to impose on renewable energy producers who use its grid to get into the retail electricity business. “The tariffs are fair and transparent,” Nova Scotia Power vice president Mark Sidebottom told a Nova Scotia Utility and Review Board hearing. Regulators began hearings…

A Canada-China free-trade deal could bring “billions and billions of dollars” to the sagging Canadian economy each year, according to an expert on the subject matter. Laura Dawson, director of the Canada Institute at the Wilson Center in Washington, recently co-authored a study on a Canada-China free-trade agreement. The study will be released next week….

During the recent climate talks in Paris, Premier Christy Clark struck a pose as one of the belles of the ball – showcasing B.C. as a climate-change leader that had proven greenhouse gases can be reduced by taxing them without ruining the economy. But B.C.’s industrial and extractive sectors are warning that raising the province’s…

Port Hawkesbury Paper has filed a North American Free Trade Agreement appeal in light of the U.S. government’s decision to uphold tariffs on the mill’s exports. The U.S. International Trade Commission released the decision papers on Wednesday, upholding a ruling that the U.S. paper industry was “materially injured” by imports of supercalendered paper from three mills in Canada owned by Port Hawkesbury Paper,…

Port Hawkesbury Paper LP is vowing to use the North American Free Trade Agreement to fight a penalizing tariff imposed on its paper exports to the United States. Management at the Nova Scotia mill was disappointed when the U.S. International Trade Commission announced Wednesday it would uphold a 20.18 per cent tariff placed on supercalendered…

As the dust settles from Monday’s federal election, to paraphrase former prime minister Kim Campbell, it’s time to talk about serious issues again. The Conservatives were hoping to make 2015 a free trade election, by signing onto the world’s largest trade deal at the end of July. But things didn’t go as planned at the…