Getting A Handle On Hardwood Checkoff

Article by Rich Donnell, Editor-in-Chief, Timber Processing March 2015

We didn’t intend to include an article on the hardwood checkoff situation in this issue. But beginning on page 10, there it is. As much as our articles are meant to inform you, this was one of those cases where the development of an article has helped to educate us as well.

We had followed, to some degree, the establishment of a softwood checkoff program in the past few years. We were aware that a hardwood checkoff program was under consideration, but we had lost touch with it as of late. Then in our previous issue we ran a press release from the Hardwood Checkoff Committee that indicated the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture had given hardwood checkoff a “green light.”

Not so fast my friends.

We were quickly informed by the Hardwood Lumber Industry Coalition, by way of the Missouri Forest Products Assn., that this wasn’t true; that the USDA and its Agricultural Marketing Service was not inclined to proceed on the proposal given the significant amount of opposition to it, as exemplified in the public comments to the proposal when it was published in the Federal Register in November 2013.

But then when we called a representative from the Hardwood Checkoff Committee, we were told that it was still very much alive.

What the heck is going on? we asked, and do we really know what a checkoff program is? As indicated on the USDA AMS web site: “Commodity research and promotion programs, also known as checkoff programs, are established under Federal law at the request of their industries. Checkoff programs are funded by the industries themselves, with the goal to increase the success of the businesses that produce and sell certain commodities.”

Sounds harmless enough, we thought, a lot of other industries have done it, so why is it causing a major rift in the hardwood lumber industry, between the “pro” forces as represented by the Hardwood Checkoff Committee and the “anti” forces behind the Hardwood Lumber Industry Coalition?

Thus began several days of researching and interviewing conducted by our writer, Dan Shell. Many questions came to mind: Is this simply a matter of some companies wanting to pay the checkoff fees that would be involved and others not wanting to? Is this a big producers versus small producers story? Does the inclusion of the hardwood plywood industry with the hardwood lumber industry in this proposal muddy up the water? Are some companies unhappy with the voting process, and how the final result is tallied, if indeed it comes to a vote? Are some companies simply coming at it from a “we don’t need to get more involved with the federal government” point of view? How effective are these checkoff programs anyway?

And perhaps the most important question of all: Is this thing dead or alive?

That’s a lot to delve into, but Dan has given it a shot.