Bill Parenteau

Looking Back, Looking Ahead:  History and the Future of the New Brunswick Forest Industries
September 28, 2011. 7:00 pm, Wu Centre, Kent Auditorium

Since the beginnings of European settlement the forest industries have been the foundation of the provincial economy as well as a central part of the political, social and cultural life of New Brunswick.  For the past decade, the forest industries have been in a state of crisis, which has prompted considerable discussion of the need to transform the industries--to move away from the manufacture of pulp and paper and low value added lumber products and to develop a more diversified, higher end forest economy.  This presentation will examine how the history of industrial transformation and the pulp and paper industry can inform the current discussions over the future.

Bill Parenteau is Professor of History at the University of New Brunswick in Fredericton who specializes in the history of Atlantic Canada, environmental history, Canadian-American relations, and the history of sport and leisure. He is currently working on a monograph on the history of the Atlantic Salmon Fishery in the decades after confederation, and he is a member of the editorial board of Acadiensis: Journal of the History of the Atlantic Region.