WARREN, Ark. (From news reports) - Weyerhaeuser Company broke ground Wednesday on a $500 million facility expected to have an impact on south Arkansas.

Officials said the company's TimberStrand facility near Monticello and Warren is expected to bring 200 "high quality" jobs to the region upon completion.

Weyerhaeuser officials explained that its TimberStrand product is a laminated strand lumber engineered for consistent strength and straightness, used in a range of building applications for single- and multi-family wood-frame construction. The new facility will add approximately 10 million cubic feet of annual production capacity, helping meet growing demand.

Weyerhaeuser CEO and president Devin W. Stockfish spoke highly of Arkansas as a business location.

"We've been in Arkansas since the mid-1950s," Stockfish said. "This is a great, great place to do business at the state level. At the local level, we've really just had wonderful engagement across the board all the way from the Governor's Office, the local community, state legislature, and federal."

Stockfish continued that the "support and engagement" from Arkansas officials is what led to the company's decision to put the new plant in Arkansas.

"Arkansas is competing where we know we can win, like in the timber industry, which is why we've made big investments in skills-based education, including at the new Forest Research Center at the University of Arkansas - Monticello," Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders said. "Major companies like Weyerhaeuser are paying attention, and we are grateful for their investment in South Arkansas."

The Timberstrand facility will be Weyerhaeuser's fourth manufacturing plant in Arkansas. The company currently operates a lumber mill in Dierks, a plywood and veneer plant in Emerson and a seedling nursery in Magnolia. Weyerhaeuser also maintains four Timberlands offices in Arkansas, including its main Southern Timberlands office in Hot Springs, and owns or manages 1.2 million acres of timberlands in the state.