IN DEPTH: What the tariff war will actually cost British Columbians

PENTICTON — The Canada-U.S. trade war is a regional fight inside a continental conflict, with British Columbia taking some of the heaviest blows.U.S. President Donald Trump’s 50% Section 338 tariffs on about $20 billion of Canadian goods took effect August 22 after Prime Minister Mark Carney walked away from talks, saying Washington “asked too much and offered too little.” A Globe and Mail analysis of 2025 trade data found nearly 14% of what BC shipped to the United States falls under that new list — the highest share of any province. Quebec and Ontario follow at 10.8% and 9%.Ottawa answered Tuesday with counter-tariffs of 15%, 25% and 50% on $27.6 billion of U.S. imports, effective 12:01 a.m. September 8.Premier David Eby called the federal list “a good start,” then immediately widened the fight..“Today the federal government announced their measures to counter US economic attacks— a good start,” Eby posted Tuesday night. “Next, why are we spending $12 billion to buy American fighter jets?”Let’s take a look at the industries likely to take the biggest beating..Forestry is the clearest victim. British Columbia is Canada’s largest lumber producer. Forest products made up about 20% of the province’s goods exports in recent official tallies, and roughly 60% of that wood still goes south. Provincial figures put BC forest-product shipments to the United States at $6.7 billion in 2024.Softwood dimension lumber was already carrying a stacked levy near 45% — anti-dumping and countervailing duties around 35%, plus a 10% Section 232 tariff imposed last year. The new Section 338 duties explicitly spare products already under Section 232, so a 2x4 is not hit a second time at 50%. What is hit is the value-added side that mills and secondary plants had treated as a partial escape hatch: plywood, fibreboard, particleboard, veneered panels, wood mouldings, doors, fixtures, paper, tissue and packaging.More than 20 mills have closed across the province since 2023. Three ended operations in the past month, including pulp capacity..The second concentrated hit is non-resource manufacturing — industrial machinery, electrical equipment, boards, tools and related parts. About 11% of BC’s total exports sit in that cluster, and nearly three-quarters of it goes to the United States. BC Stats data through June 2026 already showed machinery and equipment exports down 14.7% year-to-date, to $3.6 billion.Section 338 is worse for those plants than earlier Trump rounds because CUSMA compliance does not buy an exemption. Goods that qualify under the Canada–United States–Mexico Agreement still pay the 50% duty if they are on the annex lists. That wipes out the compliance planning many BC exporters had built since 2025.Aluminum is already in the line of fire under a separate legal track. Rio Tinto’s Kitimat smelter is BC’s only primary aluminum plant. Unwrought aluminum shipments to the United States were just over $1 billion in 2024, about 83% of the province’s aluminum exports. Those tonnes face Section 232 metal tariffs that have sat as high as 50%, not the new 338 list. Ottawa is lifting its own counter-tariffs on U.S. steel and aluminum from 25% to 50% to match.Energy is the large BC export that this particular escalation largely misses. Natural gas, crude, electricity and most critical minerals were carved out of the Section 338 proclamations. Energy products still accounted for about 21% of BC’s shipments to the United States in the first half of 2026. That is why the Prairies look less exposed on this round even as BC wood and electrical gear do not.Seafood is split. Some U.S. lists exempt fish. BC still sends a large share of its salmon and other fish south — whole salmon shipments to the U.S. have run near 90% of that category in provincial trade tables — and the sector had been one of the few bright spots, with fish and seafood exports up 27.1% year-to-date through June, to $759 million. Canada’s September 8 list, by contrast, puts a 25% duty on a long roster of U.S. fish, including Pacific and Atlantic salmon, trout, lobster, shrimp and molluscs. That is a consumer-price story more than an export-volume story for BC processors.Now for what British Columbians will pay more for..Despite what the president claims — and appears to believe — tariffs are paid by the importer. When Canada taxes U.S. goods, Canadian distributors and retailers either absorb the duty, switch suppliers, or raise the shelf price. Ottawa’s September 8 schedule is built to hurt politically useful American sectors. It will also land in BC kitchens, hardware aisles and appliance bays.Dairy is at the top of the household list. Counter-tariffs of 25% to 50% cover U.S. milk, cream, powders, whey and a wide range of cheeses — cheddar, mozzarella, cream cheese, blue, gouda, brie and others.Appliances follow at 25%: household refrigerators and freezers, stoves and ranges, dishwashers, washing machines, air conditioners and heat pumps. A large share of big-box white goods sold in BC is assembled or branded in the United States even when parts originate elsewhere. Agricultural and material-handling equipment — forklifts, harvesting machinery, attachments — is on the 15% to 25% tier, a cost for Interior and Fraser Valley operators more than for apartment shoppers.Steel and aluminum articles move to 50%, matching the U.S. Section 232 rate. That is not only mill product. It feeds construction steel, some household goods and any BC fabricator that still buys American coil or extrusion. This will likely mean higher costs for home building in what is already one of the world's most expensive housing markets, at least in the interim.Furniture and clothing are on the 50% list in federal summaries: upholstered and wooden seating, bedroom and kitchen pieces, outerwear, suits, coats, knitted garments. Toilet paper, facial tissue and similar sanitary paper are listed. So are carpets and some floor coverings. Perfume and other cosmetics appear on 50% roundups from officials briefed on the package. Golf clubs, fishing rods and related sporting goods are named. Video game consoles show up in the same official summaries. Electronics and telecommunications equipment, including smartphones, sit at 25% on the matching schedule.U.S. alcohol is the exception that is already gone. British Columbia pulled American beer, wine and spirits from government liquor stores in 2025 and stopped new purchases through the Liquor Distribution Branch. That ban, along with dairy quotas and auto measures, is one of the grievances the White House cited when it invoked Section 338. Eby has refused to restock..Eby has framed the fight as existential. On Saturday he said the collapsed talks “revealed the true nature of what the Americans are seeking” and compared U.S. demands to reducing Canada to “the economic equivalent of the 51st state.” He says he has put “every weapon” on the table, including a second look at the federal purchase of American fighter jets and, earlier, an export tax on U.S.-bound coal.He has also kept repeating a line that is directionally true and numerically thin: that Russian forest products enjoy better tariff treatment into the U.S. market than Canadian wood. As reported many times by Western Standard, however, U.S. imports of Russian sawn lumber in 2025 amount to a rounding error. Canada still supplied the overwhelming majority of American softwood import volume..The counter-tariffs are explicitly designed to create American political pain before the November midterms. Industry Minister Mélanie Joly has said as much. The same duties create Canadian consumer pain in September. BC households that still buy U.S. cheese, California or Washington grocery lines that fall under related tariff chapters, American-brand appliances, smartphones, paper goods, clothing and furniture will see some or all of that 15% to 50% show up as higher prices unless retailers eat the tax or reroute supply.The good news: substitution is possible. Mexico, Asia and domestic plants can replace some appliances, apparel and electronics. Dairy and some paper grades are stickier. Construction steel and farm equipment have fewer quick swaps. Forestry has no quick swap at all for a U.S. housing market that has been the default buyer for BC two-by-fours and panels for generations.The bad news: the White House has already signalled a further turn of the screw. Trump said this week he intends to put a 50% tariff on all Canadian automotive and steel imports effective January 1, 2027. That date matters less to BC assembly lines than to Ontario, but it matters to any Lower Mainland or Interior shop that fabricates with steel and to any hope of a negotiated climb-down on wood..What this round does not do is hit the energy spine of BC’s export ledger.What it does do is pile a second, CUSMA-proof 50% wall onto the part of the BC economy that was already shrinking — sawmills, pulp mills, panel plants — and onto the thin layer of machinery and electrical manufacturing the province had treated as its non-resource future. Shoppers will notice the rest on September 8, in the dairy case, the appliance floor and the price of American paper and clothes.Carney promised dollar-for-dollar. Eby promised he would not blink on booze. The mills that have already gone dark, and the grocery bills that have not yet moved, will measure whether either posture is a successful strategy or merely amounts to more press conference performativity.

IN DEPTH: What the tariff war will actually cost British Columbians

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