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Capital Press Editorial Board.
September 21, 2018
All other commentary pieces are
the opinions of the authors but
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Opinion
Editorial Board
Editor & Publisher
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Joe Beach
Carl Sampson
opinions@capitalpress.com Online: www.capitalpress.com/opinion
O ur V iew
Trade tariffs costly for U.S. farmers
T
his week reporters from the
Capital Press tried to put a
dollar figure to the impact
of retaliatory tariffs placed on U.S.
agriculture products to farmers
and rancher in the West.
It’s an elusive number, but
it appears to be more than $4.1
billion over the next year. That’s
a significant number in a region
where exports account for a
significant portion of farm income.
One of the central themes of
Donald Trump’s campaign for the
presidency was that the United
States was not well served by its
many trade agreements.
So, the U.S. left the Trans-
Pacific Partnership and is working
on bilateral deals with key
partners. The North American
Free Trade Agreement has been
reopened for negotiation. Mexico
and the U.S. have reached
tentative agreement and are still
Don Wilson/Port of Seattle
The Port of Seattle. President Trump promised better trade deals to U.S. farmers
but has yet to deliver.
talking with Canada.
All of this has caused concerns
with farmers and ranchers who
depend on trade.
But it’s the tariffs the
administration slapped on steel
and aluminum imports from some
of our biggest export customers
that are at the root of the most
damaging trade problems.
China, India and Mexico
responded with retaliatory tariffs
on a host of U.S. products.
President Trump has long
alleged that China manipulates
its currency to advance its sales
Mass timber
movement aims high
A
in tiny Whitefish, Mont., in
2011, when a 4,863-square-
foot commercial building was
constructed using CLT. It was
completed at a cost of $145 per
square foot and took five days
to build, according to the Wood
Products Council. The CLT
panels came from Europe —
there are now several sources
for it in the U.S. and Canada —
and the building was designed
using international building
codes.
A person doesn’t have to
be a construction engineer to
see the value of CLT — and
the potential of mass timber in
general. It is cost-effective, easy
to install and strong.
Oregon State University
and the University of Oregon
have created the TallWood
Design Institute to take the
lead in mass timber research
and development. The U of O
College of Design and OSU’s
College of Forestry and College
of Engineering have a platoon
of researchers working on new
products and designs, testing
materials and helping to chart
the future of mass timber.
The institute’s new $79
million building is also made
of CLT, though a glitch in its
the losses of every farmer in the
country.
The obvious solution for
producers, and their trading
partners, is for the tariffs to go
away. That’s unlikely to occur
without the administration being
able to claim progress on the
legitimate underlying disputes.
We’ll give the president
the benefit of the doubt that
he is working, though so far
unsuccessfully, in the interest of
American farmers and ranchers.
But having quickly put producers
in jeopardy, he needs to move
with haste to make the better
deals he promised.
Producers rightfully worry that
the trade relationships they have
worked so hard to develop will be
lost if tensions are not soon eased.
Farmers and ranchers would
rather sell to trading partners than
receive cash assistance checks.
Treat the farm as a business
O ur V iew
mass movement is
underway in Oregon — a
mass timber movement.
Mass timber is cross-
laminated timber — called
CLT — mass plywood and other
types of engineered wood that
turn lumber into large, strong
building materials that can
support multi-story buildings.
It’s been called “plywood on
steroids” and is substantial
enough to replace steel and
concrete. It’s “green” because
it comes from a renewable
resource — trees — and
sequesters carbon. It also emits
less carbon dioxide during its
production than other materials.
While mass timber has been
used in places like Europe
and Australia for decades —
huge mass timber structures,
buildings and houses have been
built across those continents
— it’s just starting to catch on
in the U.S. That’s because U.S.
building codes typically don’t
include it.
Now, however, Oregon codes
allow its use. National codes
could also allow it within a
few years, opening the door to
wider use of mass timber.
The U.S. mass timber
movement had its beginnings
abroad. There are also questions
surrounding China’s handling of
intellectual property issues.
So, the administration placed
additional tariffs on Chinese
goods to address those issues,
fueling several rounds of tit-for-tat
retaliatory tariffs. U.S. farmers and
ranchers have taken a big hit.
Last month Secretary of
Agriculture Sonny Perdue
released details of the
administration’s aid package
for farmers across the country
impacted by the tariffs. The plan
includes nearly $4.7 billion in
direct payments to producers
harmed, more than $1.2 billion in
government food purchases and
$200 million to develop foreign
markets.
While producers will welcome
the assistance, it’s clear that the
$6 billion and change provided
over the next year won’t cover
production has set back the
construction schedule.
Elsewhere in the state, Freres
Lumber Co. in Lyons, Ore., has
patented a new type of mass
timber called mass plywood.
The company’s owners say the
plywood panels can range up
to 48-feet long, 12 feet wide
and 24 inches thick, yet use 20
percent less wood and are as
strong as CLT.
Other companies in the U.S.
and Canada are also pressing
ahead with innovations, making
the future of mass timber
virtually unlimited.
Already in the U.S., buildings
as large as 156,000 square feet
and eight stories tall have been
built in Portland. Seattle allows
the use of CLT in buildings up
to six stories.
But that’s just the beginning.
A 270,000-square-foot mass
timber structure is proposed for
Chicago, and a 220,000-square-
foot seven-story apartment
complex is planned for
Minneapolis.
And a 100-story mass timber
tower has been proposed for
London, England.
Now that’s aiming high.
University of Cambridge
A 100-story mass timber
building proposed for London,
England.
By TERRY PYLE
For the Capital Press
I
f you were to poll farmers,
orchardists, dairymen and
ranchers across the country
asking why they chose agri-
culture as a profession, few, if
any, would say “I am in it for
the money.” The reason peo-
ple live and work in the ag-
ricultural industry is because
they love what they do.
The long hours of hard
work and the inherent risks
are just too much for most
people, but farmers love the
challenge. Lou Holtz once
said, “Winners embrace hard
work. They love the discipline
of it, the trade-off they’re
making to win. Losers, on the
other hand, see it as punish-
ment. And that is the differ-
ence.” This is how ag people
see themselves, tough and dis-
ciplined.
On top of the physical de-
mands there are the challeng-
es of being good stewards of
the land. We strive to produce
at the highest levels possible
while at the same time being
the greatest conservation-
ists in the world. Keeping
abreast of all the new tech-
nology and research, and how
to incorporate them into our
own operations is time- and
thought-consuming.
Every
single day of the production
season there are hundreds of
vitally important decisions
that have to be made. The fo-
cus necessarily has to be to
produce the most we can from
every acre.
The downside to all these
demands on a farmer’s time
is they force his focus onto
his work and away from the
running of his business. It
is human nature to gravitate
toward what we enjoy, so
any time he faces competing
emergencies in the office and
in the field, he will always
go to the field. I wish I had a
dime for every time a farmer
told me, “If I don’t produce
a crop, I don’t survive.” This
is an absolute truism, but the
same is also true of market-
ing, if you don’t market your
crop well, you won’t survive.
In order for an agricultural
business to succeed in today’s
economy, there has to be ac-
tive purposeful management
of cost containment, risk mit-
igation, finances, continuous
improvement, and on and on.
How is all of that possible?
Various technology tools
can support our decision-mak-
ing and management. Special-
ists are available to us who
are experts in everything from
accounting to soil sciences,
yet even with all this help, the
management of an ag business
can be overwhelming.
The business of agriculture
has many elements, and each
requires active management.
When we focus all our effort
and attention on production
we limit time devoted to the
other areas vital to our long-
Guest
comment
Terry Pyle
term success. When we see
working on those other things
as punishment, we won’t give
them the attention needed to
properly manage those ele-
ments of the business, and it
will eventually cost us.
We may embrace hard
work but as my dad used to
say, “Sometimes the answer
isn’t working harder, it is
working smarter.” With so
much going on all the time
and having to find solutions to
urgent issues on a daily basis,
finding time and motivation
to manage the business side
of things can be difficult, but
it can be done. Creating order
out of chaos is almost impos-
sible but creating order before
the chaos starts is doable.
There is an order to man-
agement that when followed
provides the structure for a
manager to successfully run
his business. Organization and
disciple are both essential ele-
ments but the order in which
we establish them is critical.
An organized plan of opera-
tion must come first. When
done correctly it will provide
the framework by which all
management decisions will be
made, which will also provide
the manager with the tools
to help him be disciplined in
handling the daily unexpected
demands on his time and at-
tention.
Set up a plan and stick to
the plan. That sounds pret-
ty simple, but any plan will
only work if the manager is
disciplined enough to stay the
course when the fires start to
burn.
Tiger Woods talks about
how his father taught him to
golf from green to tee. He
started with the end goal, put-
ting the ball in the hole. Plan-
ning should always start with
the goal. Steven Covey taught
“begin with the end in mind”
in his landmark book “7 Hab-
its of Highly Effective Peo-
ple.” We have to know what
we want to accomplish before
we can develop an effective
plan to get there.
Take a critical look at
how we are currently doing
in terms of productivity, effi-
ciency and financially. They
are all important elements of
creating an achievable plan,
but that is a topic for another
discussion.
Terry Pyle has worked
with farms and agri-business-
es in the Columbia Basin for
the past 30 years. Coming
from a financial background
and having experienced the
economic cycles of agricul-
ture, he delivers real-world
experience to the application
of financial and economic
principles. He can be reached
at tpyle@qosi.net or 509-760-
0015.