Forest as commodity revisited

Back in August, I did a post on forest as commodity. At that time, my friend Jeff Hess of Have Coffee, Will Write sent me a link to this article in the Washington Post about the struggles of a small independent logger in Alabama. Called Waiting for Work in the Silent Woods, the article shows another side to logging and to the farming of trees:

Everyone concedes that the days they’ve gone without work in May, June and July have been difficult.

“I thought I was gonna starve to death,” says Davis.

“I got a wife,” says Holloway. “I got a brand-new truck. And when we have to stay off a week at a time, I’m telling you, it hurts.”

“I got four young kids,” says Neal, digging his heels into the soft dirt.

“These last two to three weeks been rough,” adds Davis.

“You mean months!” Neal pipes in.

“Shoot, go back to Christmas,” says Benjamin. “Wouldn’t have been for Sunnyman, we wouldn’t have had any Christmas.”

“He put a turkey on the table and a couple dollars in our pockets,” says Neal.

Sunnyman slouches off toward a big tractor, checking its wheels.

“Wasn’t for Sunnyman,” Neal goes on, “whew, I’m telling you. We didn’t have but two days’ work last week and he still paid us.” For the whole week.

. . .

Experts say the downturn in the industry is cyclical, that it will come back around. It has been estimated that since the 1990s, this region has lost upward of 10,000 jobs in textiles and manufacturing to cheaper sites in Mexico. Unemployment in this area hovers at 22.5 percent. Alabama is the second-largest commercial wood-producing state in the nation, next to Georgia. The mills typically employ foresters who find landowners who want timber cut from their woods. Then the mill hires a logger such as Sunnyman, who is now saying, “I like being outdoors,” the Alabama wind on his face.

“I used to sell timber to six mills within a 100-mile radius of here,” he says. “But in the past year, three of those mills have closed. Harrigan Lumber, Browder Veneer and Weyerhaeuser. All those places took wood from me. It’s put the squeeze on me, I’m telling you.”

I wonder how many of those plants re-opened in China.

The last several months of 2009 were just a confusion of events for me and I lost track of this article. I found it while clearing things up in this quiet time between the Christmas celebration and the New Year — which will bring it’s own business.

I thought I’d just go on and share it with you.

It’s interesting to read the comments to this article. As one points out, these are not wild forest preserves, like the Daniel Boone National Forest, but managed pine plantations. On the other hand, I don’t think Weyerhauser was/is the most environmentally friendly of companies. Maybe an argument for online publication.

I wonder how things are for Sunnyman and his crew this Christmas.