TSX: WEF DUNCAN, BC, Nov. 14 /CNW/ - Western Forest Products Inc. (TSX: WEF) today announced that following an internal evaluation of its sawmills after the acquisition of Cascadia on May 1, 2006, it has decided to close its New Westminster sawmill effective February 7, 2007. At about the same time, the Company will re-open its Saltair sawmill on Vancouver Island, which has been on indefinite shut-down since October, 2005. Today's announcement follows the receipt by the Company today of certain third party agreements. The recent softwood lumber agreement between Canada and the United States had no bearing on this decision. Reynold Hert, President and CEO stated, "The decision to close the New Westminster sawmill will allow us to remove the excess capacity in mills that handle the small to midsize logs and capitalize on the Saltair sawmill's lower unit costs, additional sorting, and longer lumber-length capabilities." The New Westminster sawmill, located on the Fraser River near Vancouver, produces an assortment of lumber products of mixed species for the Asian and North American markets, and has capacity to produce approximately 150 million board feet of lumber per annum. Severance and other closure costs are estimated in the range of $16 million to $21 million. The New Westminster employees will receive their full benefits under the collective agreement. Because the New Westminster sawmill was owned by Cascadia, the closure costs will be accrued as part of the cost to acquire Cascadia and not as a restructuring charge to Western's statement of operations. The New Westminster lumber programs will be produced at the Saltair sawmill once it re-opens, which is expected to be around the beginning of February 2007. The Saltair sawmill, which is also a small to midsize log sawmill, has an annual capacity of 215 million board feet. An initial investment of about $2 million dollars in optimizing equipment will be made prior to startup of the Saltair facility. The Saltair sawmill is expected to initially operate on two shifts with 136 hourly employees. The number of hourly employees impacted at New Westminster is 284. As a result, the net reduction in hourly employment as New Westminster shuts down and Saltair starts up will be 148. As many New Westminster employees as possible will have the opportunity to move to other Western Forest Products operations. Western Forest Products Western is an integrated Canadian forest products company and the largest coastal British Columbia woodland operator and lumber producer with an Annual Allowable Cut of approximately 7.7 million cubic meters (before temporary AAC reductions) of timber and lumber capacity in excess of 1.5 billion board feet from nine sawmills and five remanufacturing plants. Principal activities conducted by the Company and its subsidiaries include timber harvesting, reforestation, sawmilling logs into lumber and wood chips, and value-added remanufacturing. Substantially all of Western's logging is conducted on government owned timberlands in British Columbia. All of Western's operations, employees and corporate facilities are located in the coastal region of British Columbia while its products are sold in over 20 countries worldwide. Forward Looking Statements and Information This press release contains forward-looking statements and forward-looking information within the meaning of applicable securities law. Those statements and information include statements or information regarding the intent, belief or current expectations of Western. Such statements or information may be indicated by words such as "approximately", "achieving", "estimated", "expect", "anticipate", "plan", "intend", "believe", "will", "should", "may" and similar words and phrases. Readers are cautioned that any such forward-looking statements or information are not guarantees and may involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties, and that the actual results may differ from those expressed or implied in the forward-looking statements or information as a result of various factors including, changes in government regulation, and misjudgments in the course of preparing forward-looking statements or information. The information contained under the "Risk Factors" section of Western's Annual Information Form and under the "Risks and Uncertainties" section of Western's Management's Discussion and Analysis identifies important factors that could cause such differences. All written and oral forward-looking statements or information attributable to Western or persons acting on behalf of Western are expressly qualified in their entirety by the foregoing cautionary statements. Western does not expect to update forward-looking statements or information as conditions change.