This paper aims to provide a better understanding of the wood flows from smallholder plantations to industrial buyers in the Binh Dinh and Phu Tho provinces of Vietnam. It describes the actors involved in the market chains, their respective roles, the value added to the wood in the market chain and the distribution of costs and benefits. Various differences between the two provinces exist. In Binh Dinh, wood flows are relatively direct and the market price information is transparent. There are various end-buyers but most are buying bark-clean logs.

HOUSTON, USA, Jan 5, 2011 - International energy pricing agency Argus today launched North American wood chip assessments. This expansion into US and Canadian wood chip pricing complements Argus' coverage of US wood pellet prices and its broader European biomass indexation.

"Argus understands the global significance of renewable fuels, and we are pleased to be at the forefront, providing transparency to emerging biomass markets," Argus Media chairman and chief executive, Adrian Binks said.

Wood chip indices are well suited for forest and energy companies who can use price indices for benchmarking and for the financial community, which can use the Indices as price risk management tools.

More than 80 million tons of wood chips, valued at almost ten billion US dollars, are traded annually in the open market worldwide and the shipment volumes are increasing.

The company that wants to build a controversial wood-burning power plant near Shelton has signed a fuel-supply contract with Mason County’s largest private timberland owner – Green Diamond Resource Co.

Terms of the contract were not disclosed, but Adage spokesman Tom DePonty said the agreement should provide about 20 percent of the 604,000 tons of wood debris the company needs to power its plant each year.

It is the first fuel-supply contract signed by Adage and a forest landowner for the $250 million project.

It takes time, sometimes decades, but people power can turn around seemingly unstoppable juggernauts. That seems to be what is happening with regard to Tasmania's old growth forests. For decades environmentalists have expressed their concern that these ancient forests, with all their attendant biodiversity were being irrevocably destroyed to feed a rapacious wood chip industry. That industry happily sold those munched up trees to Japan.