OTTAWA, Nov. 3, 2011 /CNW/ - An elite group of Ontario's leading architects, engineers, and project teams received Wood Design Awards at the 11th annual Wood WORKS! awards celebration. The awards recognize people and organizations that, through design excellence and innovation, are advancing the use of wood in construction.
Wood fibre costs for the global pulp industry reach new highs in 2011 with the biggest increases seen in Russia, Finland and Western US, reports the Wood Resource Quarterly. Wood costs account for about 60 percent of the production costs when manufacturing pulp for paper. According to the Wood Resource Quarterly, wood fibre costs have gone up about 25 percent since early 2009, reaching record levels in the 2Q/2011.Wood fibre prices, which currently are at or close to record highs, have fluctuated quite substantially over the past 24 years the WRQ has tracked global forest industry markets.
There has been a lot of analysis in the last few days concerning the impact the massive earthquake, and tsunami in Japan will have on North American timber markets.
On Friday, shares of North American timber companies jumped with the thought that an increase in lumber demand will occur to rebuild Japan’s damage.
The total revenues from timber and timber products exported from the Siberian Federal District in 2010 amounted to USD 2 bln and 342.5 mln (7,6% of total number of products exported from the region) and these figures exceed by 5% those of 2009. Round wood timber amounted to 34,6% of total price of exported timber products and the products of wood processing numbered to 65,4%.
The UK Forestry Commission is predicting that the increased use of wood-fuelled boilers could boost the industry.
According to the commission, there has been a growth of businesses and consumers opting to install eco-friendly biomass boilers to reduce fuel bills and lower emissions.
In particular, the Forestry Commission highlighted the recent decision of Bradford council to use biomass fuel at its City Hall and Ilkley Town Hall as part of commitment to reduce greenhouse gases by 20 per cent in 2010/11.
Swedish Forest Society's timber manager Magnus Juntikka is critical to the speculation about the lower Russian wood tariffs. - Very little show that the duties on raw timber will be lowered to 2 euros per cubic meteras we have read in the press. Rather, he believes the market price will be seven or eight euros for softwood pulpwood and timber and possibly hardwoods at two euros according to a pressrelease to Mynewsdesk.
More detailed price information, including data broken down by felling type, is to be published by Finland’s forest industry in a bid to help timber sales.
The Finnish Forest Industries Federation (FFIF) said the current price information based on the average stumpage price of all standing sales had become outdated.
The recent positive trend in prices on wood products has turned. It started in early November when the Forest Owners' Association Norrskog lowered the price of pine logs with 35 SEK (Swedish crowns) and the price of spruce with 20 SEK per m3 (cubic meters over bark, ie, the log total volume over bark).
Now other companies have chosen to lower prices. Holmen lowers the price of spruce by 8 percent, a decrease of 50 per cubic meter. According to the business magazine Dagens Industri the forest product company Bergs Timber plan to cut prices up to 10 percent.
Much is said about how forestry will be an important part of Indonesia’s emission reduction plan. Many in the conservation community believe that the best way to reduce net emissions is to reduce the area of forest harvested for wood products or land cleared for conversion to agriculture or other land uses.
On the surface, this sounds like a great idea, but what about the demand? How can we conserve while at the same time meeting the demand for wood and wood products?
