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Strategies & Market Trends : Fascist Oligarchs Attack Cute Cuddly Canadians -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Tommy Moore who wrote (321)	2/7/2002 6:55:33 AM
From: Tommy Moore	Respond to of 1293

The last paragraph says it all! Canada Says Softwood Talks With U.S. Canceled OTTAWA (Reuters) - Canada said on Wednesday that talks with the United States, set for later this week to settle a protracted dispute over softwood lumber, had been canceled due to divisions among U.S. delegates. Canada had demanded the United States come to the talks with a response to its proposals to address U.S. complaints about Canada's systems of logging rates for softwood lumber, used in housing construction. "This is the reason there is no meeting tomorrow. The Americans are not able to put any counter-proposal on the table. We decided there should not be a meeting if the Americans are not in a position to do that," Trade Minister Pierre Pettigrew told reporters. The United States imposed punitive duties on softwood lumber imports in August, after making a preliminarily subsidy finding against Canada. It later also imposed anti-dumping penalties. Canada sells the United States about C$10 billion ($6.3 billion) annually in softwood lumber, such as pine and spruce, supplying about one third of the market. Canada denies the charges. But its two largest lumber provinces -- British Columbia and Quebec -- have proposed changes to their royalty and fee systems to rid themselves of the costly U.S. duties, which have prompted thousands of layoff in the timber industry. In return for those changes, Ottawa has demanded that the United State assure unfettered access to its markets in the future -- something that the U.S. industry has said cannot be guaranteed. Speaking in Washington on Wednesday before Canada made its announcement, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick said the United States was trying to probe to "see if we can have a series of interlocking changes to create a market." Unlike the United States, most trees in Canada are harvested from public lands under a set of royalty or stumpage fees set by the provinces. The U.S. has long complained those harvesting fees do not reflect true private-market prices. "Canadians for the first time in 20 years have shown a willingness" to look at "some of the underlying practices that have created a lack of a (private) market in Canada," Zoellick told the U.S. Senate Finance Committee. Committee's chairman Max Baucus, a Montana Democrat and sharp critic of Canada, told Zoellick he was concerned the U.S. government was "not being quite as forceful or involved or aggressive as it should be" on the lumber case. Pettigrew said that while U.S. trade and diplomatic officials have said they want a settlement, they have to contend with "extreme" elements within the U.S. industry who do not want an agreement. The anti-subsidy duties imposed in August lapsed in mid-December but would likely be reimposed in March if a settlement is not reached, and Ottawa contends the penalties are being used to protect inefficient U.S. mills. Canada has filed a complaint about the duties with the World Trade Organization, which has ruled in Canada's favor two previous softwood lumber trade fights.