Nova Scotia and Port Hawkesbury Paper Renew and Extend Agreements

Nova Scotia announced on Wednesday (2-9-23) that the province has updated its agreements with Port Hawkesbury Paper, which will support sustainable ecological forestry practices and management of public lands.

Originally signed in 2012, the province has two separate agreements with Port Hawkesbury Paper:

1. The first agreement is the company’s forest utilization license agreement, which is a long-term agreement that guarantees an annual volume of timber from certain parcels of Crown land and set out terms and conditions. That has been updated from its original 20-year term and extended to 2043. Changes to the agreement include a lower volume of timber to ensure the province can accommodate multiple priorities on Crown land. The company can harvest up to 275,000 green metric tonnes of timber per year on about 520,000 hectares of Crown land, down from 400,000 green metric tonnes on about the same amount of land in the original agreement.
2. The second is the company’s fee-for-service agreement. The province pays Port Hawkesbury Paper to provide services that support sustainable forest management on Crown and private land. The original agreement was for 10 years. The new agreement will run until 2033, ensuring services are aligned with current ecological forestry objectives, such as helping to implement these types of practices on private woodlots. To focus more on ecological forestry and account for inflation, payment for services the company provides is increasing from $3.8 million currently to $5 million per year.

In a press release, Nova Scotia’s Minster of Natural Resources and Renewables Tory Rushton said:

“The forestry sector is important to the economy of Nova Scotia. It can be sustainably managed and aligned with our environmental goals. We’ve refreshed these agreement to continue working with Port Hawkesbury Paper as an important employer, as part of the forestry sector and a corporate taxpayer.”