Arbec Forest Products Shutting Down Indefinitely

Groupe Rémabec, one of Canada’s largest lumber producers, said it will temporarily lay off most of its workers as the industry faces weakening demand and rising US duties, the Financial Post reported (6-3-25). Groupe Rémabec employs about 2,000 people and is headquartered in La Tuque, Quebec.

Arbec Forest Products Inc., the manufacturing division of Groupe Rémabec, said in statement that it is shutting down indefinitely, leading to more than 1,000 immediate job cuts. The number may reach 1,400 in the coming weeks, citing “persistent imbalances in both access to the resource and international markets.”

The company added it hopes for “a return to operations as soon as economic and structural conditions will allow it.”

Rémabec also said a “feeling of exasperation is widespread” in the Quebec forestry industry over regulations that have created “an increasingly unstable ecosystem, without predictability or coherence.”