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The softwood lumber dispute sidetracked the British Columbia election campaign Tuesday as every party leader pivoted to address the impact a new tariff will have on a key industry in the province.

Premier Christy Clark held a meeting with members of her cabinet as she suspended campaigning for the May 9 election and cautioned against knee-jerk reactions to the duties that would jeopardize negotiations.

"This needs to be calm. Cooler heads need to prevail," the Liberal leader said outside a lumber mill in Maple Ridge.

Clark said the government tried to persuade the previous administration of Barack Obama to reach a new deal on softwood, but the U.S. didn't want to negotiate.

"It's my hope that the Trump administration, despite some of the rhetoric that we've seen, because they have been squarely focused on American jobs and growing the economy, will recognize that choking off the supply of Canadian softwood is only going to kill jobs. It's going to make houses way more expensive and that's going to be a real drag on American economic growth," she added.

The U.S. is imposing duties of up to 24 per cent on lumber imports from Canada.

New Democrat Leader John Horgan says he's disappointed by the American tariffs and is accusing Clark of failing to make the ongoing trade dispute enough of a priority.

The forest sector in B.C. is a free and fair trader, Horgan said, and past trade disputes have ruled in Canada's favour after lengthy and expensive court cases, which can be avoided.

"We need to up our political participation in this so that the United States knows absolutely that there are other interests at play between British Columbia and the United States," said Horgan, promising to visit Washington within 30 days of being elected.

Green Leader Andrew Weaver said the province has awarded too many forest tenure licenses to multinational corporations "that have no interest in keeping value and jobs in B.C." as he pushed his plan to place restrictions on the export of raw logs.