Millar Western Forest Products will draw a C$100 million federal loan to keep its three Western Canadian pulp mills running, with Ottawa reaching into a facility built for the American tariff war to back a company that sells almost nothing to the United States. That is according to an announcement by Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne on Monday, confirming that the loan will give the company room to rebuild its log inventory, steady near-term operations, and protect jobs.
Ninety-three per cent of the company’s sales go to Asian markets, primarily China, putting the mills on the far side of Washington’s lumber duties and squarely inside Beijing’s downturn. The release itself blames the weak conditions across softwood lumber, pulp, and other forest products on the trade dispute between the United States and China.
Three mills at Slave Lake and Whitecourt in Alberta, and at Quesnel in British Columbia, turn out the company’s hardwood and softwood pulp, with Quesnel River Pulp and Slave Lake Pulp joining the group in April 2024 through a purchase covering the mills, their woodlands, and their sales and logistics teams. More than 420 full-time workers run the sites, with 300 more contractors employed across maintenance, field-level forestry, and consulting services.
“Our government continues to take action to support Canadian companies,” Champagne said in the announcement, adding that the loan is about protecting jobs, supporting communities, and the competitiveness of a key Canadian industry. “Canada’s forests are the foundation for good jobs, affordable housing, and sustainable economic growth,” Energy and Natural Resources Minister Tim Hodgson said alongside the loan, describing the company as a maker of world-class Canadian forest products at a moment of global instability.
The money comes from the Canada Enterprise Emergency Funding Corporation through the Large Enterprise Tariff Loan facility, the $10 billion vehicle created in March 2025. A $500 million envelope carved out of it for softwood lumber producers last November is one slice of more than $2.35 billion in forest-sector measures announced since August 2025, and that package has grown as Washington’s newest 50 per cent duties have caught 98 forest-product tariff lines.
Chinese demand is the prize the loan protects, with lower-priced Canadian lumber gradually displacing costlier Russian and Belarusian product in the world’s largest import market, even as overall Chinese buying shrinks. Belarusian shipments into China jumped 25 per cent in June, a reminder that the sanctioned states are fighting for the same buyers.
Ottawa has spent the year repairing its channel to Beijing, with Prime Minister Mark Carney meeting Premier Li Qiang in January on the first visit to China by a Canadian prime minister since 2017, which eventually led to a new strategic partnership spanning energy, agri-food, and trade.
