| On October 16th 2006 the Canada-United States Softwood Lumber Agreement (SLA) came into effect. The SLA followed years of trade disputes and litigation initiated by U.S. lumber producers. The SLA ended litigation and dispute procedures by implementing an agreed Canadian export restriction and export tax regime. However, even with a formal agreement in place, points of contention remain on either side. The intent of this study is to evaluate Alberta’s performance under the SLA since its inception in 2006 and the implications for the future. To that end, there are several important characteristics of the SLA that are important to define. The SLA uses a system of export taxes and volume targets to attempt to restrict the total volume of softwood lumber... |
