Exports hindered by transport capacity.

The Forest Products Association of Canada (FPAC) is calling for investment in transportation capacity after Ottawa ordered Canadian National Railway and Canadian Pacific Railway to clear the backlog of Western Canadian grain.

On March 7, the federal government ordered the two rail carriers to move 500,000 tonnes of grain each a week or face penalties of $100,000 a day.

FPAC is calling for a long-term infrastructure fix to boost shipping capacity to ensure all sectors can get their goods to market.

"The forest products industry is one of the sectors now facing downtime and lost revenue because of the lack of an adequate transportation system in this country" said FPAC president-CEO David Lindsay in a March 7 news release. "Canada's prosperity depends on exports yet we often can't ship our products to market in a timely fashion." Lindsay noted that Canada's forest products...