Canadian Provinces Split on U.S. Proposal

British Columbia is open to using a U.S. proposal as the basis for settling a dispute over $6 billion a year in Canadian softwood-lumber exports, an official said, straining the country’s common front in talks with the Bush administration.

Mike de Jong, forestry minister for Canada’s biggest lumber- producing province, said there is “some good stuff” in a plan submitted two weeks ago by U.S. Commerce Undersecretary Grant Aldonas. The draft calls on provinces to auction off logging rights on government land instead of unilaterally setting the price, a practice U.S. producers say leads to subsidized costs.