A Special Issue on International Forest History || The North America-Japan Timber Trade: The Roots of Canadian and U.S. Approaches

The North America-Japan Timber Trade: The Roots of Canadian and U.S. ApproachesAuthor(s): Thomas R. CoxSource: Forest & Conservation History, Vol. 34, No. 3, A Special Issue on International ForestHistory (Jul., 1990), pp. 112-121Published by: Forest History Society and American Society for Environmental HistoryStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3983900 .

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The North America-Japan Timber Trade: The Roots of Canadian and U.S. Approaches

Thomas R. Cox

Japan is a heavily wooded country, but when its economic growth accelerated rapidly in the 1960s,

its domestic timber supply could not meet the burgeoning demand for building materials and other wood products. When Japan turned to timber imports from North America, the abrupt increase in the transpacific timber trade had disruptive effects on both sides of the ocean. In Canada and the United States cries soon arose to restrict the outflow of logs to Japan. These calls led to action, but the action taken was of a different character north and south of the forty-ninth parallel.

Succinctly put, Canada discouraged log exports but encouraged the shipment of lumber and other manufactured wood products. Canadian industry and government alike gave a relatively high priority to developing the lumber trade with Japan. By contrast the United States encouraged the log trade but gave more lip service than sustained attention to developing a commerce in sawn wood. Furthermore, government and industry in the United States more frequently worked at cross- purposes than did those in Canada, and both were more concerned with the domestic lumber market than with the market in Japan.

The notes to this article begin on page 119.

Beginnings of the Cargo Trade Most of the timber that Japan im-

ported from North America came from Washington, Oregon, and British Columbia. All three have long had important, but hardly identical, maritime timber trades. Their different experiences helped to mold their differing outlooks.2

The real beginning of the Pacific Northwest's maritime timber trade traces to the California Gold Rush, when shipload after shipload of woodstuff went south from ports of Oregon and Washington to build the instant cities of the new El Dorado. Coastal shipments dominated for decades; deepwater shipments to Hawaii and beyond played but a secondary role. Shipments to Japan did not even begin until the 1880s and long remained miniscule (see table).

Washington's timber industry was dominated by San Francisco-based capitalists who had erected mills there to serve the California market. Thus the concentration in Washington was on the coastal trade. On the whole Oregon's timber industry was less controlled by outsiders, and because it at first enjoyed a larger domestic demand than Washington, it leaned less heavily on sales in California. This was, however, more true for the major mills than for the multitude of small plants on the isolated bar harbors that dot Oregon's

coast. Small plants had few markets accessible to them other than those in California and were, if anything, even more dependent on the coastal trade than their counterparts on Puget Sound, Grays Harbor, and Willapa Bay. Cer- tainly the California market, more than any other, shaped the prosperity and early development of the timber industry in both states.3

The situation in British Columbia was different from the beginning. Like Washington, coastal British Columbia had limited local demand for the cut of its first sawmills and depended heavily on exports by sea. However, though some of its capital originated in San Francisco, especially after the industry was established, the lumber industry of coastal British Columbia was hardly controlled by San Franciscans as it was in western Washington.4 Similarly, though British Columbia's mills sold to the California market from time to time -the amount fluctuating not only with conditions in California but also with the tariff policies of the United States-on the whole they depended much more on transpacific markets than on the California trade. Depen- dence on deepwater, rather than coastal, markets was the hallmark of British Columbia's coastal lumber industry. When Captain Edward Stamp erected his Hastings Mill Company on Burrard Inlet in the 1860s, he anticipated that he would be able to compete in the lucrative San Francisco market. When he found this not to be the case, he and Gilbert Sproat, his successor as manager of the mill, worked assiduously to develop contacts and cater to demand in Australia, Shanghai, and elsewhere around the Pacific Basin.5

The coming of transcontinental rail connections changed the West Coast's lumber industry. Railroads led to the opening of important interior markets; indeed, the rail trade eventually proved more lucrative than the maritime trade. As a result, the "cargo mills" (mills that depended on exports by sea) began to decline.6 Statistical evidence is frag- mentary, but the shift to dependence on rail markets appears to have been less complete in British Columbia than in Oregon and Washington. Oregon and Washington had transcontinental rail connections earlier and in greater number than their neighbor to the

112 Forest & Conservation History July 1990



north, and the domestic markets to the east were larger and more lucrative. Coastal mills in British Columbia enjoyed a sizable demand for timber from the development of the Okanogan Valley and prairie provinces, but demand was not as great, especially after 1914, as that enjoyed by the millmen of Oregon and Washington from the U.S. interior. Furthermore, the Canadian market appears to have been more fully served by interior mills than were the newly opened rail markets in the United States. These circumstances apparently helped keep the lumbermen of coastal British Columbia interested in overseas markets, while U.S. lumbermen became more and more continental in orientation. Working in the same direction were Canadian lumber's preferential treatment in Australia and interruptions in Canadian shipments to the United States as a result of changes in U.S. tariff policies.7

Canada Falls Behind Around the turn of the century there

was a resurgence of the cargo trade. This encouraged George Anderson,

Japanese Timbr Imports and Domestic Prdtudion, 1880-1980 (in thousands of cubic meters, round-wood equivalents)

Imports, including Domestic hardwoods production

1880 4 7,474 1885 3 8,135 1890 3 7,345 1895 13 9,782 1900 40 13,494 1905 55 14,046 1910 61 15,599 1915 45 17,023 1920 345 21,021 1925 2,105 20,662 1930 2,400 18,721 1935 1,357 26,339 1940 324 40,881 1945 11 21,026 1950 88 36,431 1955 2,054 43,909 1960 6,379 48,525 1965 17,836 50,375 1970 47,238 46,241 1975 45,645 34,577 1980 48,531 34,557

Sources: Isamu Nomura, Shin Gaizai Tokuhon (Tokyo, Japan: Ringyo Shimbunsha, 1978), p. 7; Minoru Kumazaki, "Ringyo hatten no ryoteki sokumen,' Ringyo Shikenjo Kenkyu~ Hokoku 201 (March 1967): 114-15; Japan Forestry Agency, Statistics on Forest Products Concerned (Tokyo: Japan Forestry Agency, 1983), p. 1.

the Canadian Trade Commissioner to Japan, to see that rapidly modernizing country as a potentially important market. He noted that since "demand for lumber of all kinds is simply enormous, this will certainly be one of Canada's largest exports to Japan, and the saw-mills of British Columbia should be eager to supply the eastern trade." Anderson represented the van- guard of the Canadian government's efforts to aid the nation's lumbermen to market their cut in Japan - efforts that have continued to the present.

But the Japanese market proved difficult to penetrate. The leading Canadian importer in Kobe noted that Japanese builders and contractors demanded timber in different dimensions than what was normally cut: "Their mea- surements are peculiar to themselves, and unless shipments are exactly to order they are invariably refused." To sell lumber in Japan, he thought, it would be necessary to erect mills there to resaw imported cants.1

Such technical concerns were not the the worst of the problems confronting Canadians interested in the Japanese market. Freight rates were on the rise, and charter vessels were in short supply. British Columbia's lumbermen found it necessary to charter vessels in San Francisco to carry their cargoes. Although U.S. investment in British Columbia's lumber industry was grow- ing, the province's mill owners com- plained that San Franciscans were more diligent in seeking charters for U.S. than for Canadian mills. The charge appears valid. Preferential treatment to Americans was a serious handicap for British Columbia's lumbermen.

Faced with seemingly insurmountable problems, Canadian lumbermen seem to have done little to win a market in Japan, instead focusing their efforts on interior rail markets and established overseas outlets. Although small increases in Canadian sales to Japan did occur, one observer argued that they were simply a result of a "desire on the part of foreign houses to secure Canadian lumber."9

Resurgmene of the Cargo Trade Meanwhile a number of mills in

Oregon and Washington were showing

increased interest in transpacific shipments. New competitors, many freshly arrived from the upper Lake States, where timber supplies were dwindling, were capturing a significant portion of the rail trade to the interior of the United States, and new mills in southern Oregon and northern California were supplying by rail much of the demand in California that had once been met by seagoing coastal shipments. The combined effect of this new competi- tion was to drive the owners of older U.S. mills located on deepwater ports to look overseas for sales. Since they had less difficulty than their Canadian competitors in acquiring vessels to carry their cut, their percentage of the overseas trade rose. Although Canadians continued to dominate in Australia and other markets where they had long- established contacts and received preferential treatment, Americans soon developed a near monopoly on the lumber trade in Japan.10

As sawmills around Puget Sound turned enthusiastically to overseas trade, several began importing logs from coastal British Columbia, where supplies were abundant and cheap. The exportation of raw logs soon generated concern in British Columbia. In 1901 provincial authorities passed regulations (which went into effect the following year) restricting the exportation of raw logs. In doing so, they were following in the footsteps of Ontario and Quebec, which had passed similar restrictions in response to U.S. tariff policies that encouraged the exportation of logs to the United States, thus hurting local lumber producers. British Columbia's legislation, in contrast, was in response not to U.S. tariff policies, but to the exportation of logs, a trend seen as a threat to provincial employment and economic development. In 1906 British Columbia's new Forest Act extended and tightened the province's legislation: "All timber cut on Crown lands, or on lands granted after the twelfth day of March, 1906 . .. shall be used in the Province, or be manufactured in the Province." This restriction against the exportation of raw logs was still on the books when the Japanese timber trade began expanding during the 1960s.1l

Japanese Trade 113



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Most of the timber sent from the Pacific Northwest to Japan was in the form of large cants called 'lap squares," shown in this 1920s-era photo. The squares were resawn upon arrival to meet the needs of the Japanese domestic market. Photo courtesy of the Oregon Historical Society (OrHi 5133).

Japan Emerges as a Major Market

The Pacific timber trade was disrupted by World War I, and save for a period during the 1920s, it never fully recov- eredY Nevertheless, the timber trade with Japan first became truly important during this period. Japan's rapid development during the late Meiji (1868-1912) and Taisho (1912-26) eras created demand too great to be met from domestic stands (see table). Japanese millmen visited Howe Sound to investigate the possibility of rafting logs to Japan, and they purchased North American equipment to resaw cants imported from British Columbia to match Japanese specifications. Pur- chases of Douglas-fir- appreciated as a reasonably priced, high-quality con- struction timber- and Port-Orford- cedar and western redcedar-which resembled the Japanese favorites, hinoki and sugi, used in finishing- rose sharplyPl

Shipments of cedar were a new departure. In 1921 The Timberman observed that as yet "the amount [of cedar] exported does not total a great deal but [it] helps swell the exports of a wood for which hitherto there has been very limited demand.' 14 Indeed, purchases were sufficiently large that some buyers had to accept lower grade logs or go without. Nevertheless, British Columbians found little market for Alaska yellow-cedar, which they had available in large quantities. Japanese

thought it too different in appearance to be an acceptable substitute for sugi or hinoki.5 The exportation of cedar resulted in an increase in the ratio of logs to cants and lumber in the total export trade. However, many owners of merchantmen reportedly were unwill- ing to charter their vessels for the log trade, complaining that the enlarged butts of cedar were difficult to load and wasted much cargo space.

In 1922 the Akita Lumber Company, one of Japan's largest, announced plans to open an office on the West Coast to expedite the purchase of Douglas-fir for shipment to Japan. One Oregon journalist expressed concern over the effect of timber exports on the balance of trade between the United States and Japan. Merchant vessels took large quantities of timber to Japan, he noted, but returned almost empty. But concern was less common than rejoicing. The Timberman announced boldly: "Japa- nese demand . . . saved the lumber industry last year from what probably would have been the worst period of depression in many years.'86 And exports continued to grow. Within three years, Japan was recognized as the largest foreign market for the Pacific Northwest's forest industries.

As the trade developed, the Japanese registered frequent complaints about the quality of the lumber they received- especially from the United States. Howard D. Taylor of the Page Lumber Company, Seattle, visited Japan and observed that many of the complaints were legitimate. Japanese consumers

were sophisticated and demanding, he noted; U.S. lumbermen needed to take more care in inspection and grading. He also urged U.S. lumbermen to go overseas to learn the peculiarities of the Japanese market and its specifications. The Japanese echoed his recommenda- tion. R. D. Horning reported that during an inspection trip to Japan he was frequently asked, "Why doesn't the lumberman from the West Coast come to Japan, study our requirements and produce specifications and grades suit- able for our market?" A few U.S. firms heeded the advice and profited as a result, but on the whole the response was to urge the Japanese to adopt U.S. standards. Sixty years later, Japanese were still asking Americans the same questionY7

Since the Japanese could seldom get Americans to cut lumber to their specifications, they preferred to import logs. Horning warned that "the Japanese lumberman, unless we awaken to the situation, will be forced to buy cedar logs, and cedar logs alone, in order that he may secure satisfactory specifications for his trade."8 Perhaps the problem stemmed from the limited place that the Japanese market held in the thinking of American sawmill operators. As Jiro Muro, editor of Zaimoku Shimbun [Lumber Press] of Osaka, observed, shippers in the United States seemed happy with single sales and failed to court continuing ones. Under such circumstances, there was little incentive for Americans to change familiar practices09

The great Kanto earthquake and fire of 1923 increased Japanese demand for timber, but North American lumbermen found their efforts to supply wood to rebuild the devastated Tokyo-Yokohama area hampered by port facilities that were soon clogged with lumber and other supplies needed in the aftermath of the disaster.20 Fortunately, there were more dispersed and lasting sources of demand in Japan, and the trade continued to grow. In 1924 the Lumber Exporters Association of Portland persuaded the Department of Com- merce to add two men to its Tokyo staff- one experienced with construc- tion and building- to cover the lumber situation there thoroughly.

That same year The Timberman expressed concern that anti-Japanese




actions, such as laws governing land ownership by aliens and immigration restrictions, in the United States might undermine the trade. In the last three years, the journal noted, Japan had become the largest foreign customer for U.S. lumber: "It certainly is poor policy [for the United States] to need- lessly offend and slam the door in the face of its good friend and Oriental customer. This may be considered good politics, but it certainly does not lend itself to building up friendly relations or increasing our business ... with Japan.&'21 The Timberman's fears seem to have been unwarranted. Not until the collapse of Japan's vital silk trade and worldwide depression around 1930 did the transpacific timber trade fall off significantly22 (see table).

Canadians Find an Opening The Kanto earthquake gave Cana-

dians an opportunity to win a share of the Japanese lumber trade. Arthur E. Bryan, Canada's trade commissioner in Yokohama, had been working for years to break the U.S. stranglehold. Now, with U.S. firms unable to meet the sud- den surge in demand, he obtained an order for 50 million board feet of Douglas-fir and cedar.

Seven years earlier, Bryan had met Harold R. MacMillan, who was then Canada's special trade commissioner, charged with seeking foreign outlets for Canadian lumber. Bryan handed the Kanto order over to the H. R. MacMillan Export Company. With this entree, MacMillan was able to build up a sizable Japanese trade that continued throughout the decade. The company opened offices in Tokyo, Yokohama, and Kobe and built up its own merchant fleet to transport timber to Japan.

Other Canadian mills followed MacMillan's lead. From 1924 through 1926 one billion board feet of sawn wood went from British Columbia to Japan.23 Most shipments were in the form of large cants called "Jap squares" (approximately two feet by two feet, and forty feet long), which were resawn by Japanese buyers to meet the needs of the local market. Still, demand was uneven, and sales on the whole seem to have fallen short of what lumbermen

either in Canada or the United States had hoped for.

The quantity of North American lumber sold in Japan may have seemed small to North American millmen, but the shipments seemed anything but small to the Japanese.24 To protect domestic Japanese mills, Japan enacted a 15 percent import duty on sawn lumber. When the domestic mills sub- sequently "found themselves unable to handle the immense volume of squares pouring into the country," Americans predicted that the duty would be lifted. This proved to be wishful thinking. As Jiro Muro noted, wealthy Japanese timber owners saw the value of their stands increasing steadily under existing conditions, and therefore had no desire to see them change. Indeed Japa- nese timber owners, lumbermen, and government officials joined in efforts to restrict- or at least stabilize- timber imports, to protect domestic producers and jobs. Significant steps in that direction had been taken throughout the 1920s, but the Great Depression and the resulting stagnation of the timber trade rendered such actions moot.25

From Approval to Protedionism

The North American timber trade may have generated opposition in Japan during the 1920s, but it was applauded both in Canada and the United States. Most of the timber sent to Japan was at least sawn into squares, the sale of which was welcomed by millmen faced with that decade's gen- erally sluggish domestic markets. No domestic needs were left unfilled as a result of the shipments to Japan. In the first place, the shipments were not large enough to create domestic dis- locations; in the second, there was an ample supply of logs for domestic and foreign sales alike.

In the mid-1930s the situation changed. As Japan recovered from the impact of worldwide depression, its need for imported logs grew. The total volume of timber shipments to Japan was down from its volume in the 1920s, but Douglas-fir peelers and Port-Orford-cedar logs were being dispatched in such quantities that domestic North American consumers began to fear a shortage. Protests

against log exports arose on both sides of the border. The protest was particu- larly loud from the infant plywood industry in the United States. Disturbed by the prospect of losing out in world markets to a Japanese product turned out with less expensive labor, the plywood industry saw restricting the export of peeler logs as a way of protecting their market share -and thus both jobs and profits.26

In the protectionist atmosphere of the thirties and in the context of grow- ing diplomatic frictions, such concerns carried much weight. Responding, Senators Rufus Holman (Republican, Oregon) and Lewis Schwellenbach (Democrat, Washington) introduced legislation into Congress in 1939 to ban the exportation of all Port-Orford- cedar logs and nearly all Douglas-fir peelers. Senator Charles McNary (Re- publican, Oregon) offered an amend- ment to add Sitka spruce logs (used in aircraft production) to the list of em- bargoed items. Support for the bill was widespread: President Franklin D. Roosevelt expressed sympathy, Governor Clarence D. Martin (Democrat, Wash- ington) came out in support, both the American Federation of Labor and the Congress of Industrial Organizations favored passage, and the lumber industry's trade press lauded the measure. However Secretary of State Cordell Hull, an advocate of reduced trade restrictions, opposed the bill, and although it was passed by the Senate, it languished in the House, pushed into the background by the concerns of approaching war.27

For Canada, war came sooner, but calls for export restrictions did not drop from sight as a result. Instead, they joined with concern over trade with enemy nations to produce federal legislation that extended restrictions on log exports to lands not covered by British Columbia's legislation of 1901 and 1906. Like the province's export restrictions, these federal regulations remained on the books following the war, although largely without effect. But events on both sides of the international border during the thirties and forties were harbingers of things to come in the 1960s, and in 1969 the Canadian regulations were rejuvenated as a means of encouraging domestic manufacturing and protecting jobs.28

Japanese Trade 1 I5



British Columbia's Postwar Trade

The differences between British Columbia's forest industry and those of Oregon and Washington quickly reestablished themselves after World War II. American mills returned to serving the domestic market (now by truck as well as rail); California's explosive growth during the postwar years took lumber as fast as north- western producers could cut it. Many of the old cargo mills closed, and most of those remaining concentrated on coastwise shipments to the Golden State. Meanwhile sawmills in coastal British Columbia recommenced exporting a significant portion of their cut by sea, encouraged by the concentration of the province's Douglas-fir stands in the Vancouver district. But not just sawn wood was going overseas. By 1969, in addition to over 70 percent of its lumber, nearly all of British Colum- bia's cedar shingles and shakes, most of its pulp and paper, and one quarter of its plywood were being shipped to foreign markets, the bulk by sea.29

British Columbian timber exports were aided by U.S. legislation designed to provide protection for U.S. seamen. The Jones Act, passed in 1920, required that goods be carried from one port of the United States to another in American- flag vessels. Goods originating in foreign ports, in contrast, could be carried in bottoms of any registry and therefore enjoyed a tremendous advantage. Thus, lumber bound by sea to the eastern United States from Oregon or Washing- ton had to be transported on relatively expensive U.S. ships, while lumber from British Columbia could be shipped on the cheapest tonnage available. With the advantage the act provided- usually some fifteen to eighteen dollars per thousand board feet-lumber from British Columbia won a larger and larger share of the lucrative East Coast market. During and after the 1950s, the U.S. became British Columbia's main market, and older outlets, such as Australia, dwindled in importance. Meanwhile, producers in Washington and Oregon concentrated on the mid- western and California markets.30

Thus when demand from Japan took off during the 1960s, British Columbia

had a long tradition of dependence on maritime markets, experience in serving them, a resource base conveniently located for doing so, and a body of existing legislation ensuring that lumber and other manufactured wood products, not raw logs, would dominate the trade. British Columbia's lumber shipments to Japan were soon second only to her shipments to the East Coast of the United States. By contrast, the industry in Oregon and Washington was oriented to a greater extent than ever toward domestic outlets. But there were other differences between the industries on the two sides of the border, not the least of which was the pattern of timber ownership.

The vast bulk of British Columbia's forestland remained in public ownership, only about 5 percent having been alienated. This gave government authorities-and behind them public opinion -more control over logging practices, log use, and the like than was possible in the United States, where private ownership of timberland was more extensive.3' Although large private timberland owners in the United States, such as the Weyerhaeuser Com- pany, were never free from the effects of public attitudes, they were far less con- strained by them than were policy- makers north of the border. Thus in spite of protests from labor representa- tives and others, many private timberland owners in Oregon and Washington decided to sell raw logs for export rather than for manufacture at home. In British Columbia, however, provincial authorities were more responsive to demands that they protect jobs, and they used existing legislation to ensure that only logs not needed by local mills received export permits. Fears of Canada becoming a mere producer of raw materials for the world's economic superpowers, which were strong during the period, undoubtedly encouraged the retention of these restrictions. Under these regulations, exports usually took less than 2.5 percent of the province's log production.32

Oregon, Washington, and the log-Export Question

But private ownership of stands was not the only factor encouraging the ex-

port of raw logs from Washington. Al- though Oregon had disposed of nearly all of its educational-endowment lands in the nineteenth century, Washington had held onto the bulk of its school land. Much of this acreage was heavily forested, and sales of its timber became a significant source of revenue for financing education. Bert Cole, Wash- ington's longtime commissioner of public lands, welcomed the high prices offered for logs in the 1960s by buyers from Japan. Rejecting pleas that logs from state lands be sold to domestic buyers who would manufacture them inside the state, thus generating employment, Cole argued that he had a responsibility to maximize returns to help finance Washington's often finan- cially strapped public schools. In the name of the public, Cole resisted public pressure to reduce log exports. Not all state authorities agreed with him, but Cole persevered, and the state of Wash- ington became one of Japan's largest suppliers of logs.

By way of contrast, in Oregon and California state officials concerned themselves primarily with protecting jobs and (especially in California) with the high cost of housing, to which log exports allegedly contributed by driving up the cost of lumber. Thus Oregon and California officials were in the forefront of proponents of export restrictions. Federal authorities, however, fearing that lowering exports would worsen the nation's balance of pay- ments, hesitated to endorse either restrictions or an outright embargo.33

Division of opinion in the United States over the advisability of log exports generated a number of studies that sought to go beyond rhetoric and assumptions and determine the actual effects of log exports on employment, lumber prices, and related matters. On the whole, these analyses seemed to demonstrate that the effect of log exports was less negative than opponents claimed.34 But such studies failed to sway the critics of exports -or, apparently, the general public. The studies were often commissioned by- or, at least, seemed written in the service of- those with vested interests in the export trade. Moreover they took a narrowly econometric approach that gave scant attention to social factors, the greatest concern of many.

1 6 Forest & Conservation History July 1990



Except in communities heavily involved in the export trade, public perceptions of the trade were largely negative. And opposition voices were frequently heard even where the trade was most important, such as Coos Bay, Oregon.35 Reflecting popular views more than those of the experts, Governor (later Senator) Mark Hatfield (Republican, Oregon), Senator Wayne Morse (Demo- crat, Oregon), and others pushed for and eventually got restrictions on the export of logs from federal lands. How- ever exports from private lands and from Washington's state holdings went on, and the log-export controversy continued to rage. The storm did not abate until the recession of the late 1970s brought a virtual halt to housing starts and made sales of any type of forest products anywhere seem welcome.36

The recession of the 1970s was international. With housing starts off both in the eastern United States and in Japan, British Columbia's two main outlets, the province's lumbermen suffered as surely as did lumbermen in the United States.37 Nevertheless, with shrinking domestic markets, by 1982 log exports had risen from slightly over 1 percent to almost 3 percent of annual production.

But no major campaign to scrap export restrictions appeared. Indeed Douglas Evans, president of the Inter- national Woodworkers of America local in Vancouver, went on the offen- sive against the increases in log exportation, fearing that markets for raw logs then being developed would be hard to reduce when the domestic sawmill industry began to recover: "We could be starting a trend that could lead to the exporting of thousands of jobs from this province." He warned against "the ridiculous situation" in the United States, "where a sawmill on one side of the harbor has been shut down because they could not obtain the raw material while on the other side ships are being loaded with logs for Japan. Situations of that nature must never be allowed to happen in this country." Evans's fears may have been over- blown; provincial authorities showed no inclination to abandon their policy of restricting log exports or their commitment to thereby protecting local jobs and encouraging economic development.38

Winning a PMae in the Japanese Market

Thus differing land ownership patterns and governmental concerns led authorities in Canada and the United States to adopt widely divergent policies on log exports. Within the industry, differing traditions encouraged lumbermen in the two areas to approach the Japanese market in separate ways. To be sure not all producers within each country took the same tack, but on the whole there was a discernible difference between the approach of lumbermen from Oregon and Washington and those from British Columbia. The

differences were duly noted by Japa- nese buyers and forestry officials.39 Simply put, the Canadians were more willing than the Americans to study the Japanese market and tailor their products to it.

Specifications and grades had been a source of friction between Americans and Japanese in the 1920s, and they soon became so once more. When the Japanese rejected U.S. dimensions and grades for lumber and plywood, many in U.S. industry and government com- plained of "invisible" (and by implica- tion irrational or duplicitous) barriers to trade. The trade delegations they formed in response were faced with

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US. timbermen felt pressure from all sides as trade with Japan expanded rapidly in the 1960s. This cartoon, from Western Timber Industry (June 1964), comments on some of the industry's least favorite government policies.

Japanese Trade 117



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uphill work. Many U.S. lumber producers kept the same attitude that had prevailed in the 1920s: "If it is good enough for the American market, it is good enough for the Japanese." One expert on foreign trade, returning to southern California from a trip to help the operators of small West Coast sawmills penetrate the Japanese market, commented in exasperation, "They [the U.S. lumbermen] are impossible!"40 And a Japan Forestry Agency official, noting the limited efforts Americans made to understand the Japanese market, commented caustically on Ameri- cans who sold themselves as "experts" after spending only three or four days in Japan.41

The Canadian timber industry responded differently, in large part because it was working under a different set of constraints. Canadian regulations limited that country's lumber industry to exporting manufactured wood. To succeed with this product,

the industry turned early to careful examination of market conditions in Japan -frequently with a level of government-industry cooperation rare in the United States.42

Japan's standards for smoothness of cut and allowable deviation from stated dimensions for "rough" lumber provide a case in point. Japanese architecture leaves much wood exposed, and rough or uneven pieces must be planed or sanded by hand, a costly process. Japanese lumbermen use saws with small teeth to produce lumber that is smooth and has few saw marks-and as a result requires little hand sanding. Japanese grading standards, designed to keep hand finishing within reason- able bounds, proved difficult for U.S. manufacturers of rough lumber to meet, oriented as they were toward rapid, large-scale production. U.S. government officials and sawmill operators, used to more lenient standards, often viewed the decisions of Japanese inspectors as arbitrary acts

designed to keep perfectly good U.S. lumber out of Japan. In fact, however, the inspectors were simply applying the standards that had developed in response to the specific needs of the Japanese building industry.

Many U.S. producers attempted to get around the problem by planing the lumber they shipped to Japan. Japanese importers claimed, however, that planed lumber had so little air space between pieces that when stacked in their yards during Japan's hot, humid summer it was soon attacked by molds and stains, making it relatively value- less. Importers with large stocks of planed lumber sometimes sold at almost any price as summer approached, greatly disrupting the market.

Typically the Canadians responded differently. Recognizing the problem, at least two Canadian mills installed Japanese milling equipment so they could turn out a product suited to the market being served. Numerous others also took steps to ensure that the lumber they sawed was suited for the market in Japan. In the United States only one small mill in Oregon seems to have taken an approach similar to that of the Canadians.43

The evidence is suggestive rather than conclusive, as it must of necessity be in such cases, but it appears that lumber producers in the United States were less attuned to the circumstances of the Japanese market than were many of their competitors in Canada. Some suggest that the U.S. lumber industry failed to penetrate the Japanese market for manufactured wood because Americans concentrated their efforts on the log trade, encouraged by the Japanese who wanted to promote domestic employment by importing not finished lumber, but raw logs.44 Canadians, on the other hand, succeeded in the manufactured-wood market because they had to. Con- strained by government regulations against log exports, Canadian producers had no choice but to target the market for manufactured wood.

On the other hand, some suggest that U.S. industry failed to penetrate the Japanese market because it failed to understand it. This failure of under- standing, they argue, is a product of the low priority that major producers




give to overseas markets; they view them only as minimally profitable outlets to fall back on when domestic demand dries up. The British Colum- bians, on the other hand, have always given a high priority to overseas markets. The industry in British Columbia, for example, has depended on overseas markets for 120 years and more. This outward orientation was reinforced by Canada's position as a member of the British Commonwealth; the United States had no equivalent.

These views all seem to contain some truth, but more than this seems to be involved. British Columbia's landholding patterns make regulation easier, and the province's long desire for economic development without subordination to outsiders helps to make the restriction of log exports palatable. But even this combination of factors seems inadequate to explain fully the different approaches that Canadians and their North American neighbors have taken to the Japanese timber trade.

Such things are impossible to quan- tify, but the historical differences in the development of the forest industries in Canada and the United States seem to have created traditions and perceptions that, to some degree, have affected the decision making of today's corporate executives, just as they have affected the actions of voters and politicians on the two sides of the border.45 The training, outlook, and motivation of forest-industry executives in British Columbia and in Oregon and Washing- ton are remarkably similar, and only the differing historical experiences of the industry on the two sides of the border, which encourage the executives to see potential profits in different places, seems adequate to explain their different approaches to the Japanese market.

To Japanese observers - timber importers, government officials, and scholars alike -the contrast between the business practices of Canada and the United States seems real enough. Indeed the Japanese frequently cite Canada's approach to selling manufactured-wood products in Japan (limited though that success might seem to the Canadians) as the approach the United States should take if its producers truly wish to increase their sales in Japan.46 But

considering the glacial pace at which old patterns of behavior change, it seems unlikely that either nation will take up the approach of the other in the near future.

Furthermore, the differing approaches of the United States and Canada to the Japanese market are not the only significant variables. It is not at all clear that significant increases in lumber sales in Japan will be possible without internal changes, both of policy and conditions, in Japan itself.47 A

Notes 1. For a different perspective on the trade, see

Thomas R. Cox, "The North American- Japanese Timber Trade: A Survey of Its Social, Economic, and Environmental Impact," in World Forests in the Twentieth Century, edited by John F. Richards and Richard Tucker (Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press, 1988), pp. 164-86.

2. For details, see Thomas R. Cox, Mills and Markets: A History of the Pacific Coast Lumber Industry to 1900 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1974).

3. Ibid., pp. 46-137, 161-98; Thomas R. Cox, "William Kyle and the Pacific Lumber Trade: A Study in Marginality," Journal of Forest History 19 (January 1975): 4-14; Edwin T. Coman, Jr., and Helen M. Gibbs, Time, Tide and Timber: A Century of Pope and Talbot (Stanford, California: Stanford Uni- versity Press, 1949), pp. 59-138.

4. Cox, Mills and Markets, pp. 133-37; Joseph Collins Lawrence, "California's Influence on the Industrial and Commercial Development of British Columbia, 1858-1885" (paper presented at Pacific Coast Branch, American Historical Association, Santa Clara, Califor- nia, August 1968); William H. Hutchinson, "California's Economic Imperialism: An Historical Iceberg,' in Reflections of Western Historians, edited by John C. Carroll (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1969), pp. 67-83. British Columbia's lumber industry first concentrated in southern Vancouver Island and in or near the city of Vancouver, and it is these areas that are referred to here. Even after World War II, in spite of much development of the forest products industries in other areas, most of the province's lumber was produced in this region. See Albert L. Farley, "The Forest Resource," in British Columbia, edited by J. Lewis Robinson, published for the 22nd International Geo- graphical Congress (Toronto, Ontario: Uni- versity of Toronto Press, 1972), pp. 87-118; Walter Gordon Hardwick, "The Forest Industry of Coastal British Columbia: A Geographic Study of Place and Circulation" (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Minnesota, 1963), pp. 5-16.

S. Cox, Mills and Markets, pp. 133-37,285-86; Hardwick, "Forest Industry of Coastal British Columbia,' pp. 16-25; Joseph Collins Lawrence, "Markets and Capital: A History of the Lumber Industry of British Columbia" (M.A. thesis, University of British Columbia, 1960); Geoffrey W. Taylor, Timber: History of the Forest Industry in B.C. (Vancouver, British Columbia: J. J. Douglas, 1975), pp. 18-33; James Morton, The Enterprising Mr. Moody and the Bumptious Captain Stamp: The Lives and Colourful Times of Vancouver's Lumber Pioneers (Vancouver, British Columbia: J. J. Douglas, 1977).

6. Coman and Gibbs, Time, Tide and Timber, pp. 210-22; Cox, Mills and Markets, pp. 199-226, 284-96; Edmond S. Meany, Jr., "History of the Lumber Industry of the Pacific Northwest to 1917" (Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard University, 1935), pp. 114-38.

7. On the importance of the rail markets, see Cox, Mills and Markets, pp. 136, 199-207, 212-18, 287-91; Thomas R. Cox, "Lower Columbia Lumber Industry, 1880-1893;' Oregon Historical Quarterly 67 (June 1966): 160-78; John H. Cox, "Organizations of the Lumber Industry of the Pacific Northwest, 1889-1914" (Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Berkeley, 1937); Robert E. Ficken, "Weyerhaeuser and the Pacific Northwest Timber Industry, 1899-1903;' Pacific North- west Quarterly 70 (October 1979): 146-54; Lawrence, "Markets and Capital;' pp. 37-41, 64-67, 113; Hardwick, "Forest Industry of Coastal British Columbia;' pp. 25-37; Coman and Gibbs, Time, Tide and Timber, pp. 210-20. Farley, "Forest Resource;' p. 103, notes that there were many new interior mills established in British Columbia in the 1880s and 1890s, but they overcut their stands, and most soon closed or moved on. While they lasted, however, these mills competed effec- tively in interior markets. The collapse of the building boom in the prairie provinces hastened the decline of these mills and strengthened the need of coastal millmen for overseas markets.

S. Canada Lumberman 18 (May 1898): 4. 9. Canada Lumberman: 18 (January 1898): 1;

18 (February 1898): 8 (quotation); 18 (Octo- ber 1898): 13; 19 (February 1899): 6; 19 (Oc- tober 1899): 21; 20 (August 1900): 25; and 21 (March 1901): 1; Canada Lumberman, Weekly Edition 4 (28 December 1898): 2; Donald MacKay, Empire of Wood: The MacMillan Bloedel Story (Vancouver, British Columbia: Douglas and McIntyre, and Seattle: University of Washington Press, both 1982), pp. 35-37.

10. Coman and Gibbs, Time, Tide and Timber, pp. 185-89, 208-9; Cox, Mills and Markets, pp. 284-92; MacKay, Empire of Wood, pp. 35-39. British Columbia's share of the region's timber exports fell from 30 percent in 1894 to 17 percent in 1913. Responding, the government sent H. R. MacMillan abroad to find markets for the province's lumber. See MacKay, Empire of Wood, pp. 37-39.

11. Canada Lumberman: 19 (February 1899): 6; 22 (January 1901): 14; 22 (March 1901): 1; 22 (July 1901): 10; and 22 (December 1901): 10;

Japanese Trade 1 19



Royal Commission on Forest Resources, Timber Rights and Forest Policy in British Columbia (Victoria, British Columbia: Government Printer, 1976), 1: 305, 2: E1-2; Gary R. Lindell, Log Export Restrictions of the Western States and British Columbia, USDA Forest Service, General Technical Report PNW-63 (Portland, Oregon: Pacific Northwest Forest and Range Experiment Station, 1978), pp. 10-11. On the legislation of Ontario and Quebec, see Canada Lumber- man: 18 (January 1898): 6-7, 10; 18 (Novem- ber 1898): 8; 19 (July 1899): 8; 19 (August 1899): 8; 19 (December 1899): 9, 11; and 20 (May 1900): 9; James Elliott Defebaugh, History of the Lumber Industry of America (Chicago, Illinois: American Lumberman, 1906-1907), 1: 177-78, 456-61.

12. Coman and Gibbs, Time, Tide and Timber, pp. 185-99; Frank Langdon, The Politics of Canadian-Japanese Economic Relations, 1952-1983 (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1983), pp. 10, 16.

13. The Timberman: 22 (June 1921): 103, 104; 22 (July 1921): 60; 22 (September 1921): 78-79; 22 (October 1921): 80-81; 23 (December 1921): 81; 23 (April 1922): 70; 23 (May 1922): 52; and 24 (August 1923): 36; Minoru Kumazaki, "The Role of Forestry in Japanese Economic Development" (paper presented at Pacific Coast Branch, American Historical Association, Honolulu, August 1986), pp. 2, 10, 12. On the Davis rafts that the Japanese hoped to use, see The Timber- man 22 (July 1921): 37; Kramer A. Adams, "Blue Water Rafting: The Evolution of Ocean Going Log Rafts;' Journal of Forest History 15 (July 1971): 24-25. American shipments to Japan increased some tenfold from 1917 to 1921 and continued rising thereafter, reaching over 1,187 MBF in 1924.

14. The Timberman 22 (July 1921): 60. IS. The Timberman 22 (September 1921):

74-75, 79. 16. The Timberman: 23 (April 1922): 77;

23 (May 1922): 52; and 25 (May 1924): 40. Hemlock exports lagged, apparently because initial shipments were not properly handled in Japanese yards, and as a result the wood got a bad reputation for warping and splitting. See The Timberman 23 (August 1922): 481.

17. The Timberman: 23 (August 1922): 481; and 26 (May 1925): 74-75 (quotation). The tendency to ship low-quality lumber to Japan may have stemmed in part from shippers' memories of selling a considerable quantity of such woodstuff to China during the late nineteenth century, leading to assumptions that similar shipments would also sell well in Japan. See Cox, Mills and Markets, p. 242.

18. The Timberman: 23 (August 1922): 481; 24 (September 1924): 50; and 26 (May 1925): 74-75, 210 (quotation).

19. The Timberman 23 (December 1921): 87; 24 January 1923): 82.

20. The Timberman: 25 (September 1923): 24, 27, 97; 25 (November 1923): 108, 167, 240; 25 (January 1924): 117; 25 (February 1924): 49, 116; 25 (May 1924): 48, 120; 26 (December 1924): 214; 26 (June 1925): 76; Export and Shipping Journal 4 (September 1923): 6, 20; 4 (December 1923): 3-4, 15, 17; 4 (December

1923): 5-6, 13; 5 (February, 1924): 3-4 12; 5 (April 1924): 10, 12; 5 (May 1924): 9; Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 13 March 1924; Kumazaki, "The Role of Forestry in Japanese Economic Development," p. 15.

21. The Timberman 25 (May 1924): 40 (quotation), 48.

22. Cox, Mills and Markets, p. 286; Walter A. Radius, United States Shipping in Transpacific Trade, 1922-1928 (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 1944), pp. 88-98; Ivan Elchibegoff, United States International Timber Trade in the Pacific Area (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 1949); E. A. Selfridge, American Lumber in Japan (Washington, D.C.: Department of Commerce, 1928). Kumazaki, "The Role of Forestry in Japanese Economic Development," p. 12.

23. MacKay, Empire of Wood, pp. 100-104; Hardwick, "Forest Industry of Coastal British Columbia," 37-38. See also Langdon, Canadian-Japanese Economic Relations, pp. 2-8.

24. Tamotsu Watanabe, Gaizai yunyiu no josei to sono taisaku [Foreign Timber Importation Situation and its Countermeasures] (Tokyo, Japan: Teikoku Shinrinkai, 1925), especially pp. 280-95. From a position as a net ex- porter of wood prior to 1920, Japan's self- sufficiency ratio fell to 72.8 percent between 1925 and 1929. See Minoru Kumazaki, "Ringyo hatten no ryoteki sokumen: Ringyo sanshutsudaka no keisoku to bunseki (1879- 1963) [Quantitative Aspects of Forestry Development: Measurement and Analysis of Forest Output, 1879-1963]," Ringyo Shikenjo Kenkyiu Hokoku [Bulletin of the Government Forest Experiment Station] 201 (March 1967): 50.

25. The Timberman 23 (January 1922): 81; 23 (May 1922): 81; 23 (April 1922): 70; 24 (August 1923): 36; 26 (December 1924): 214. Duties on lumber were sharply if temporarily reduced following the Kanto earthquake and fire.

26. Radius, United States Shipping in Transpacific Trade, pp. 332-34; Coman and Gibbs, Time, Tide and Timber, pp. 297-303, 321-24; Portland Oregonian, 3 October 1936; The Timberman 39 (June 1938): 11-13; 40 (De- cember 1938): 40-41; Donald R. Zobel, "Port-Orford-Cedar: A Forgotten Species,' Journal of Forest History 30 (January 1986): 32-33, 35.

27. The Timberman 39 (April 1938): 12; 40 (Feb- ruary 1939): 9-10; Franklin D. Roosevelt to Clarence D. Martin, 18 March 1939, in Franklin D. Roosevelt and Conservation, 1911-1945, edited by Edgar B. Nixon (New York: Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, 1957), 2: 309-10; Roosevelt to Martin, 19 March 1939, reprinted in Western Equipment and Timber News 12 (June 1961): 11; Congres- sional Record, 76th Cong., 1st sess., (1939), pp. 998, 6742, 7091-92, 8365-67, 9398, 9643; "Senate Report No. 563," 76th Cong., 1st sess., (1939), Senate Executive Reports 7: 10294-10304.

28. Langdon, Canadian-Japanese Economic Relations, pp. 9-14; Hardwick, "Forest Industry of Coastal British Columbia," 39-46;

Lindell, Log Export Restrictions, p. 10; Royal Commission on Forest Resources, Timber Rights and Forest Policy, 1: 305; 2: E1-2.

29. Farley, "Forest Resource," p. 116. 30. John W. Austin and David R. Darr, "The

Jones Act and the Douglas-fir Region Soft- wood Lumber Industry in Perspective,' Journal of Forestry 73 (October 1975): 644-48; Stuart U. Rich, Markets in the Changing World of the 1970s (Eugene: Forest Industries Management Center, University of Oregon, 1969), pp. 141-45; Royal Commission on Forest Resources, Timber Rights and Forest Policy, p. 292; Patricia Marchak, Green Gold: The Forest Industry in British Columbia (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1983), pp. 4. Compare Dan Wyant, "Northwest Timber after the Fall: Canada' sixth in a series, Eugene (Oregon) Register-Guard, 1S November 1985.

31. About 10 percent of the area in British Columbia's public forestlands is under some form of lease or license or lies within provincial parks, but even here public regulation of logging practices and timber use is far greater than is practical on privately owned stands. See Thomas Roach, "Stewards of the People's Wealth: The Founding of British Columbia's Forest Service:' Journal of Forest History 28 (January 1984): 14-23; Farley, "Forest Resource; pp. 92-93.

32. Marchak, Green Gold, p. 7; John Clarke, "Exporting Raw Logs-A Serious Issue,' British Columbia Lumberman 66 (October 1982): 28-29; Lindell, Log Export Restric- tions; Kathleen K. Weigner, "Forest Products:' Forbes Magazine, 3 January 1983. The best sources for the full range of debates over the log-export issue in the United States remain Log-Exporting Problems, Hearings before the Subcommittee on Retailing, Distribution, and Marketing Practices of the Select Com- mittee on Small Business, United States Senate, 90th Cong., 2nd sess. (1968); and U.S. Senate Select Committee on Small Business, Report on Log-Exporting Problems, 90th Cong., 2nd sess. (1968). The strength of socialist traditions in British Columbia probably helped bring about greater regulation of its forests. See Carlos A. Schwantes, Radical Heritage: Labor, Socialism, and Reform in Washington and British Columbia (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1979).

33. Report on Log Export Problem (Olympia: State of Washington, Department of Natural Resources, 1965); U.S. Senate Select Com- mittee on Small Business, Log-Exporting Problems, pp. 49-85,1358-67,1639-52; Sacramento Bee, 31 March 1973; San Diego Union, 8 April 1973; San Diego Labor Leader, 13 April 1973. Log prices rose sharply with demand, leading sawmill operators to complain about the dearness, as well as the scarcity, of logs. No comparable increase in log prices took place in British Columbia. See Austin and Darr, "The Jones Act"' p. 648. For extended testimony on the effects of log exports on lumber costs, see Problems in Lumber Pricing and Production, Hearings before the Subcommittee on Housing and Urban Affairs of the Committee on Banking




and Currency, United States Senate, 91st Cong., 1st sess. (1969).

34. For examples, see W. Halder Fisher, Report on Analysis of the Relationship of Softwood Log Exports to the Economy of the State of Washington (Columbus, Ohio: Battelle Memorial Institute, 1964); Merl Jay Arnot, "Employment Effects of Log Exports to Japan from the Oregon South Coastal Region" (M.A. thesis, University of Oregon, 1968); Alfred A. Weiner, "Export of Forest Products: Would Cutting Off Log Exports Lower Prices of Wood Products?" Journal of Forestry 71 (April 1973): 215-16; David R. Darr, "Soft- wood Log Export Policy: The Key Issue;' Journal of Forestry 78 (March 1980): 138-40, 151; Roger A. Sedjo and A. Clark Wiseman, "Log Export Restrictions: Some Findings," Journal of Forestry 78 (December 1980): 738-40; A. Clark Wiseman and Roger A. Sedjo, "Have Controls Reduced Log Exports in the Pacific Northwest?" Journal of Forestry 83 (November 1985): 680-82; David Darr, Softwood Log Exports and the Value and Employment Issues, USDA Forest Service Research Paper PNW-200 (Portland, Oregon: Pacific Northwest Forest and Range Experi- ment Station, 1975); Richard W. Haynes, Price Impacts of Log Restrictions under Alternative Assumptions, USDA Forest Service Research Paper PNW-212 (Portland, Oregon: Pacific Northwest Forest and Range Experiment Station, 1976); David R. Darr, Richard W. Haynes, and Darius M. Adams, The Impact of the Export and Import of Raw Logs on Domestic Timber Supplies and Prices, USDA Forest Service Research Paper PNW-277 (Portland, Oregon: Pacific North- west Forest and Range Experiment Station, 1980); R. A. Oliviera and G. W. Whittaker, An Examination of the Dynamic Relation- ships-and the Lack thereof-Among US. Lumber Prices, US. Housing Starts, US. Log Exports to Japan, and Japanese Housing Starts, Oregon State University, Agricultural Experiment Station, Special Report 565 (Corvallis: Oregon State University, 1979); A. Clark Wiseman and Roger A. Sedjo, "Welfare Economics and the Log Export Policy Issue," in Issues in US. International Forest Products Trade: Proceedings of a Workshop, edited by Roger A. Sedjo (Washington, D.C.: Resources for the Future, 1981), pp. 187-263; David Darr and Darius Adams "U.S.-Japanese Log Trade: Effect of a Ban;' ibid., pp. 216-32; Barney Dowdle, "Log Export Restrictions: Causes and Con- sequences;' ibid., pp. 248-58; Roger A. Sedjo and A. Clark Wiseman, "The Effectiveness of an Export Restriction on Logs;' American Journal of Agricultural Economics 65 (Feb- ruary 1983): 113-16.

35. Reflecting what seems to be the popular attitude are Tom Alkire, "The Mills Run Out: This Time It's for Real;' Portland (Oregon) Willamette Week, 26 May 1980; Steve Woodruff, "Logs Across the Water; Jobs Across the Sea;' Portland (Oregon) Willamette Week, 2 June 1980; Steve Woodruff, "Log Exports Mean Fewer Jobs,' Forest Planning 4 (July 1980): 10-11, 14, 18; Longview (Washington) Daily News, 20 January 1983. On local and social factors, see Dewey Ray,

"Timber Flow from West Coast: Fine for Ports but Not for Processors," Christian Science Monitor, 27 February 1979; William G. Robbins, "The Social Context of Forestry: The Pacific Northwest in the Twentieth Century," Western Historical Quarterly 16 (October 1985): especially pp. 421-27; Marchak, Green Gold, pp. 1-28, 301-80.

36. There is no adequate history of log-export restrictions. However the story can be followed in Japan Lumber Trade Journal and Western Timber Industry (the latter published under various titles). See especially: Western Timber Industry 17 (October 1966): 1; 17 (December 1966): 3; 18 (May 1967): 9; 19 (February 1968): 1; 19 (August 1968): 1; 19 (September 1968): 4; Edward P. Cliff [chief, U.S. Forest Service], "Export of Logs from Federal Administered Forests" (paper presented at meeting of Western Wood Products Association, Portland, Oregon, 24 April 1968 [copy in Cliff Papers, Forest History Society, Durham, North Carolina, vol. 4]); John Clark Hunt, "You Go Crazy with Logs," American Forests 74 (July 1968): 14-17, 49; 74 (August 1968): 32-35, 58-59; Lindell, Log Export Restrictions. On changing attitudes and arguments, see John Clarke, "Exporting Logs-A Serious Issue," British Columbia Lumberman 66 (October 1982): 28-29; Stuart U. Rich, "Export Market/ Domestic Market Relationships of North- western Lumber Mills," Forest Products Journal 31 (August 1981): 18-19; Sylvia Harrell, series of articles, Lewiston Tribune, 27-29 December 1980; Steve Forrester, "Rebound or Not, Forest Industry Must Build Exports," Seattle Argus, 24 September 1982; Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 12 August and 24 October 1982; Portland Journal of Commerce, 29 February 1982; Jim Kadera, "Oregon's Timber Operators Dip Toes into Log Export Market," Portland Oregonian, 9 May 1982; Olympia (Washington) Daily Olympian, 18 May 1982.

37. Historically housing has taken about 77 percent of the lumber consumed in Japan. Housing starts in Japan fell some 40 percent during the decade 1973-82. See William E. Penoyar, "The Japanese Market for Solid Wood Products," Forest Products Review 36 (Spring 1980): 17-20; Japan Forestry Agency, Statistics on Forest Products Concerned (Tokyo, Japan: Forestry Agency, 1983), pp. 15.

38. Clarke, "Exporting Raw Logs," pp. 28-29. 39. Isamu Enokido (president, Enokido Lumber

Co.), interview with author, Tokyo, 12 March 1984; Ryoichi Takano (president, Canada House Co.), interview with author, Tokyo, 7 March 1984; Tomoo Aoyagi (Trade Sec- tion, Japan Forestry Agency), interview with author, Tokyo, 9 March 1984; Takashi Kato (Forest Economics Section, Forestry Research Center), interview with author, Tsukuba, 5 March 1984. Unless otherwise noted, all interviews for this article took place in Japan.

40. Name withheld on request. 41. Aoyagi interview. Along this line, it should

also be noted that American analysts studying the Japanese forest products trade- largely foresters and economists -have almost totally ignored the voluminous literature on the

trade that has been turned out by Japanese forest economists and others (in Japanese). For an introduction to this literature, see Cox, "The North American-Japanese Timber Trade'" More general are Conrad Totman, 'A Century of Scholarship on Early Modern Japanese Forestry, 1880-1980, Environmental Review 9 (1985): 34-53; Kenichiro Moritaki, 'An Appraisal of Socio-Economic Studies of Resource Problems in Japan, Annals of the Association of Economic Geographers 29 (1983): 217-33.

42. For examples, see G. S. Crawford, The Japanese Lumber Market: Some Trends and Factors of Significance for British Columbia (Vancouver: British Columbia Research Council, 1965); Robert B. Forster, Japanese Forestry: The Resources, Industries and Markets, Information Report E-X-30 (Ottawa, Ontario: Forestry Service, Depart- ment of the Environment, 1978); "Building a Market for Canadian Lumber," Focus Japan 10 (February 1981): 8.

43. Enokido interview; Takano interview; Yuko Fujita (architect, Mitsui House Co.), interview with author, Tokyo, 21 March 1984; Langdon, Canadian-Japanese Economic Relations, pp. 119-20; (Salem) Oregon Statesman, 31 May 1982; Eugene (Oregon) Register- Guard, 14 November 1985; San Diego Union, 4 May 1986. Lumber bundled for oceanic shipping is more prone to deterioration than lumber properly stacked with stickers between layers in a yard. However, restacking with stickers after arrival in Japan is costly and time consuming, and thus is not usually done.

44. These arguments are reflected, if not fully articulated, in Western Timber Industry 19 (March 1968): 1; Woodruff, "Log Exports Mean Fewer Lumber Jobs"; Woodruff, "Logs across the Water"; Rich, "Export Market/ Domestic Market Relationships of North- western Lumber Mills."

45. For an introduction to the role of historical experience in shaping community values, see Dorothy 0. Johansen, "A Working Hypothesis for the Study of Migrations,"' Pacific Historical Review 36 (February 1967): 1-12.

46. Takano interview; Enokido interview; Aoyagi interview; Kato interview; Masahisa Nishizawa (professor of forestry, Kyushu University), interview with author, Fukuoka, 29 February 1984. The argument would be more persua- sive, of course, if Canada had been more suc- cessful in expanding lumber sales in Japan. British Columbia's exports succeeded more in the East Coast markets of the United States than in Japan. Still in 1967, a fairly typical year, British Columbia sold 491 million board feet in Japan compared to 39.8 million board feet for lumbermen from Oregon and Washington.

47. The future of the timber trade is beyond the scope of this paper. However see Japan Forestry Agency, "Long-Range Prospect regarding Demand and Supply of Important Forest Products" (Tokyo, Japan: Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, 1973); David R. Darr and Gary R. Lindell, "Prospects for U.S. Trade in Timber Products;' Forest Products Journal 30 (June 1980): 16-20.

Japanese Trade 121



Documents

A Special Issue on International Forest History || The North America-Japan Timber Trade: The Roots of Canadian and U.S. Approaches