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Stora Enso has completed negotiations on the permanent closure of its Veitsiluoto sawmill in Kemi, Finland. Sawmill production in Northern Finland will be centralised from Veitsiluoto to the company’s other sawmills.  As a result of the decision, approximately 60 people will be made redundant. Source: Timberbiz In August 2026, Stora Enso announced that it was planning to permanently discontinue production at its Veitsiluoto sawmill and centralise production in Northern Finland to Stora Enso’s other sawmills. The reason for the change is the need to improve the efficiency, profitability, and competitiveness of sawmill operations in Northern Finland. The profitability of the sawmill business is expected to continue challenging due to, among others, the high cost of logs. Production at Veitsiluoto sawmill has been cur-tailed temporarily since early August, and production will now be discontinued permanently. “The decision to close Veitsiluoto sawmill was difficult. I want to emphasize that the Veitsiluoto team has done excellent work, especially in safety. We will work closely with Stora Enso’s other sites, the employment area of Sea Lapland, and other stakeholders to support our employees in re-employment. “We offer, among other things, relocation services and re-employment coaching. In addition, we offer support measures for those who wish to transfer to another work location,” said Matti Lielahti, Head of Stora Enso Business Unit Oulu. In recent years, Stora Enso has expanded its operations in Northern Finland. The company will continue to deliver high-quality redwood products from its other sawmills for demanding applications. The closure will have only a minor impact on the Business Unit’s wood supply and consumption in Northern Finland. There is demand for high-quality logs at the Oulu, Oulainen, and Kalajoki sawmills as well as for chips and pulpwood at the Oulu board mill. After the change, Stora Enso will employ approximately 840 people at Business Unit Oulu’s board mill, sawmills in Oulu, Oulainen, and Kalajoki, and port operations.

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Farmer lobby group TasFarmers says government documents revealing the agricultural assessment for the purchase of Rushy Lagoon understated the regional impact of the acquisition. Source: The Weekly Times Rushy Lagoon, Tasmania’s largest farm, was earlier this year sold to the Tasmania Natural Asset Trust – backed by investment from UK forestry and farmland investor Gresham House and others – for $142m, with plans to plant 12 million radiata pine seedlings across 9000ha of the farm. Government documents relating to the agricultural assessment conducted in regards to the sale were released this week and refer to ABS data from 2020-21 that shows across 21,723ha, Rushy Lagoon supported 3300 beef cattle and 1800 dairy cattle, representing 4.65% of beef cattle and 4.52% of dairy cattle in the Scottsdale-Bridport SA2 region. But TasFarmers chief executive Nathan Calman said that at its peak in 2018 the property was estimated to be running 7000 sheep, 8000 beef cattle and 4000 dairy cattle, and that “under the right ownership and management, this is an extremely productive agricultural property”. “Its size and scale mean its contribution extends well beyond the farm gate, supporting the viability of agricultural businesses and services across the region,” he said. In its declaration for the plantation forestry project on the location, Delta Forestry, on behalf of Gresham House and the Tasmanian Natural Asset Trust, assessed that removal of the property’s dairy herd and beef herd would reduce Tasmania’s farmgate value by approximately $7m for dairy and $6m for beef. The documents reveal First Assistant Secretary, Sustainability, Climate and Strategy Division at DAFF Nick Blong “does not intend to make an adverse finding”. “This is because, in my opinion, the following information before me does not suggest that if the project went ahead there would be an undesirable impact on agricultural production in the region where the project would be located,” his correspondence shows. Mr Calman said the process used to assess the project “does not adequately reflect the real outcomes for North East Tasmania”. “The current guidelines provide that where a property is not operating at its potential, ABARES regional data can be used to assess whether conversion to carbon farming will affect the agricultural production of a region,” he said. “Based on 2018 levels of production, it would be fair to estimate that the conversion will result in a reduction of over 10% of dairy and beef outputs, which is significant and should be grounds for the decision being reversed by the Minister or their delegate.” Mr Calman said other concerns over the purchase include whether supply chains exist to support the planting, harvesting and sawmilling of timber, as well as change in the proposed future use of the property. “Given the scale of Rushy Lagoon and the public funding involved, there needs to be much greater certainty and transparency about the long-term plan for the property,” he said.

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The future of Australia’s housing will rely on advanced manufacturing, driving prefabrication solutions, anchored in timber-based building systems, especially engineered wood products produced from the nation’s plantation resources. Source: Timberbiz That future will be the centrepiece of The Precinct Investor Symposium in Melbourne on 14 October 2026, where three internationally recognised leaders in plantation market analysis, engineered wood manufacturing and architectural design will outline how Australia can build a domestic value chain linking plantations, products and prefabrication. IndustryEdge Managing Director Tim Woods, Raute engineered wood products specialist Roumiana Vassileva, and Melbourne School of Design Director Professor Dan Hill will deliver a keynote program examining the changing face of Australia’s plantation industry and the opportunity to connect this established resource with the way homes will be designed and built in the future. Tim Woods is one of Australia’s leading strategists in the fibre value-chain. For more than half a decade his focus has been on transforming the plantation fibre supply chain in the Green Triangle to produce high value engineered wood products. This work already includes the development of bluegum glulam (GLT) and the rapidly developing opportunity to manufacture Laminated Veneer Lumber (LVL). Heading an industry collaboration, Woods now leads The Precinct development, which will manufacture LVL, GLT, a range of other timber-based building products and prefabricated building components, at world scale in Portland, in south west Victoria. He will outline The Precinct concept, manufacturing platforms and opportunities. “Australia imports enormous amounts of engineered wood products and other building materials. We have to turn that around, reduce our wood fibre exports and rapidly increase our sovereign manufacturing to increase national resilience in housing,” Mr Woods said. “This transformation is urgent, to support Australia’s evolving transition towards more industrialised and prefabricated solutions that can increase housing supply and quality.” Roumiana Vassileva is a global market intelligence executive with 25-plus years of experience in engineered wood products, spanning production, operations, sales and marketing. For 15 years, she has led market intelligence and business development at Raute, a global technology leader in peeling-based technology solutions. Her perspective connects LVL’s material efficiency, advanced technology and mar-ket evolution with automation, prefabrication and modular construction, revealing the strategic leap from producing engineered wood to building scalable, globally competitive construction systems. She brings a global lens to the opportunities, challenges and competitive dynamics shaping Australia’s engineered wood future. Professor Dan Hill brings an international perspective on design, cities, technology and the built environment. His keynote will explore how prefabrication, new materials and industrialised construction could help Australia rethink not only how homes are built, but how we design the places in which peo-ple live. Alongside other expert speakers and panellists, Woods, Vassileva and Hill will draw the connections from plantation fibre resources, to world-scale advanced manufacturing of engineered wood products, to the prefabricated transformation of Australia’s dwellings and built environment. “The opportunity is much bigger than forestry or manufacturing in isolation,” Mr Woods said. “Australia has the ingredients it requires to increase sovereign housing supply capability. The Precinct is about bringing those pieces together and creating a new and more resilient domestic value chain from plantations to products to prefabrication.” The Precinct Investor Symposium will be held in Melbourne on Wednesday, 14 October 2026. To learn more visit www.theprecinctportland.com.au

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Three of this year’s finalists – the New Sydney Fish Market, the Adelaide Aquatic Centre and The Forest at the University of Tasmania, have been shortlisted for the World Architecture Festival, which opens in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, on 18 November. Source: Timberbiz They are among 20 Australian projects on a festival shortlist of 416, drawn from more than 630 entries, and in each of them timber is doing structural work. The Fish Market, a finalist in the Commercial Building category, sits on Blackwattle Bay beneath what its entry describes as Australia’s largest engineered timber roof, a canopy of 594 glulam beams spanning 20,000 square metres and storing more than 1,000 tonnes of biogenic carbon. The Adelaide Aquatic Centre, a finalist in the new Sports and Recreation category, carries 324 cubic metres of glulam and 108 cubic metres of cross-laminated timber, with beams up to 37 metres long, supplied full length, spanning the aquatic halls without a column. The Forest, a finalist in both Public Building and Sustainability, retained 60% of the structures already on its site, framed what was new in Tasmanian Oak, and cut upfront carbon by 40% before a single new material was specified. Two of the three are also in contention at the National Architecture Awards, which will be announced in Brisbane on 29 October, with the Fish Market shortlisted for Commercial Architecture and The Forest for both Educational Architecture and Sustainable Architecture.

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A new radiata pine breeding seed orchard in North Canterbury, New Zealand, has moved from promise to delivery giving shareholders a clear path to faster deployment of elite genetics across Australasian production forests. Source: Timberbiz Earlier in 2026, Radiata Pine Breeding Company Limited (RPBC) invested in 23 additional hectares near Amberley to address the time constraints involved with the industry’s access to improved pollen and scion material. As New Zealand’s only specialist radiata pine breeding company, RPBC sits at a critical point in the forestry value supply chain. Its work supports growers, seed producers and processors through 16 shareholders that collectively own or manage 1.6 million hectares of commercial forestry plantations, across New Zealand and east-ern and south-eastern Australia. The new property will transform RPBC’s operating scale. Its breeding and archiving programme used to cover six hectares at Amberley, holding about 9,000 individual trees across 500–600 genotypes. The new orchard (over time) will lift that capacity to 34,000 trees with the added security of irrigation. In due course, its former six-hectare site will be sold. The first two hectares at the new property have been planted with 1625 grafted scions which include approximately 250 genotypes. RPBC’s board – together with RPBC’s management team – inspected the site late in August. RPBC Chairman Ross Dickson (Forestry Corporation of NSW) who travelled from Sydney, said the strong establishment of the scions was another important step in RPBC’s bigger picture. He confirmed that the key driver for the investment is to increase the deployment of genetic gain from the breeding programme into production forests at a commercial scale. “We are already seeing early flower and pollen production from the grafts,” Mr Dickson said. “That was expected given Amberley’s environment, soil type and the performance of other seed orchards in the area but seeing it this early is a powerful indication that the site is right. “It means for both the shareholders and other stakeholders that RPBC is well on the way to accelerating the production of genetically improved material with the additional scale of this new property. Bearing in mind we only realise the value of superior genetics when they are deployed.” RPBC plans to plant as much as possible, depending on planting availability through 2027. The plantings are being staggered under the supervision or RPBC’s Breeding Orchard and Field Trials Manager Will Stout, to take advantage of emerging superior genotypes. A mixed-age planting plan also allows for a steady and diverse stream of pollen and cones for industry. Mr Dickson said the investment, along with genomic selection, will ultimately maximise genetic gain, reduce operational risk and cut the time lag between breeding advances and their deployment into forests. “It will be a vehicle for unlocking the important genetics we have in RPBC’s pantry and within three to five years, we expect the August 2026 plantings to be producing increased volumes of pollen and scion material for seed orchards.” He added that there is much to celebrate within the move as RPBC’s strong scientific work can now be effectively transformed into practical progress. “This is the step from the lab bench into the forest,” Mr Dickson said. “Scaling up the new orchard will tackle the shortage of pollen and scion material faced by large seed-orchard producers and accelerate the flow of improved genetics into commercial plantations.

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Bevan Eatts Western Australia’s Shadow Minister for Forestry has accused the Cook Labor Government of risking the future of Western Australia’s native sandalwood industry by pursuing major changes without proper consultation with the people who have spent decades building it. Source: Timberbiz “Today I raised the issue in Parliament through a grievance to the Government, outlining concerns about plans to remove the Forest Products Commission (FPC) from commercial wild sandalwood operations, and replace the existing model with a licensing system, administered by the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions (DBCA),” Mr Eatts said. Mr Eatts said the proposal threatened one of WA’s oldest export industries and a sustainable regional sector that supports jobs, Indigenous contractors, pastoral businesses and international markets. “If I can make the time as Shadow Minister to meet stakeholders, travel to Kalgoorlie, visit operations and listen to harvesters, processors, distillers and exporters, why hasn’t the Minister done the same before making decisions that could destroy another sustainable WA industry?” Mr Eatts said. “This industry has spent decades building its reputation, international customers and the WA sandalwood brand. Once those markets and relationships are lost, you don’t simply get them back.” Mr Eatts said industry participants remained concerned about the future of the integrated supply chain currently coordinated by the FPC, including harvesting, certification, traceability, processing, market access and regeneration. “A licence does not replace a supply chain,” Mr Eatts said. “You cannot take away the structure supporting harvesters, Indigenous contractors, pastoral businesses, processors and exporters and expect everyone to fend for themselves. “This is also a renewable resource with regeneration built into its commercial model through Operation Woylie. If the Government removes the FPC, who coordinates that regeneration, who supplies the seed and who pays for it?” Mr Eatts said uncertainty surrounding the Government’s plans was al-ready affecting customer confidence, with industry warning international buyers were considering alternative supply arrangements beyond December 2026. “This is exactly why you consult before making the decision, not after the damage has been done,” Mr Eatts said. “WA has something special: a sustainable native industry, a premium product and a brand recognised around the world. The Minister still has the opportunity to sit down with the people who built it and find a sustainable way forward. “I’ve gone out and listened to them. Why hasn’t the Minister?”

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AFPA has welcomed legislation passed by Federal Parliament this week to establish a single, specialist trade remedies body to better support Australian timber manufacturers. Source: Timberbiz The Customs Amendment (Safeguard Inquiries) Bill 2026 transfers responsibility for conducting safeguard inquiries from the Productivity Commission to the Anti-Dumping Commission, which will be renamed the Australian Trade Remedies Commission (ATRC). “We sincerely thank the Federal Government for strengthening Australia’s trade remedy arrangements and recognising the need for greater specialist capability,” AFPA Acting Chief Executive Officer Richard Hyett said. “Moving responsibility for safeguard actions from the Productivity Commission into a single specialist agency – the ATRC – will help to improve the capabilities and effectiveness of the overall trade remedies system. “Consolidating responsibility for all trade remedies functions within the ATRC will also enhance regulatory efficiency, streamline processes and provide Australian manufacturers and consumers with a single expert body.” Mr Hyett said the widespread support for the legislation demonstrated these changes and their objectives have been well received across industry and other stakeholders. “In a recent submission, we said there must be a clear and accessible pathway for Australian industries to bring forward cases to the ATRC when they believe they are being harmed by unfair or damaging trade practices,” Mr Hyett said. “A well-functioning trade remedies system is vital for Australian manufacturers operating in globally competitive markets and facing growing international trade pressures. “However, we remain concerned that the ATRC must be provided with adequate resources to fulfil its expanded remit and undertake its responsibilities effectively. Furthermore, international trading systems are evolving rapidly due to significant geopolitical uncertainty. Australia must be vigilant and look to continue to evolve our trade remedies system to meet the increased risks of the changing landscape. “We look forward to working with the Government and the new ATRC to ensure Australia has a strong, responsive and accessible trade remedies system that sup-ports local manufacturing and a level playing field.”

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The NSW Government is progressing its alignment with the new Commonwealth Government environment laws that affect the regulation of forestry operations by tasking the NSW Natural Resources Commission (NRC) to develop a Strategic Assessment for forestry operations in NSW. Source: Timberbiz The assessment will be undertaken under Part 10 of the Commonwealth Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBC Act). The Commission will lead the assessment in collaboration with relevant NSW agencies and in conjunction with the Australian Government. The assessment by the NRC will cover public native forestry, plantation and private native forestry operations across forests sitting within NSW’s defined Regional Forest Agreement boundaries. The long-standing exemption for forestry operations between the Commonwealth and NSW across large areas of NSW forests, known as the Regional Forest Agreements (RFA), will cease on 1 July 2027 following the introduction of new environment legislation by the Commonwealth in November last year. Reforms to the Commonwealth’s Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act last year introduced a new era for environmental protection and improved productivity in Australia. “The Albanese Government congratulates the Minns Government on reaching this important milestone, which will deliver better protections for the environment and more certainty for industry,” Federal Minister for the Environment and Water Murray Watt said. “As part of our landmark national environmental law reforms passed by the Australian Parliament at the end of last year, RFA forestry will need to meet the same Federal environmental requirements as other industries. “We’re providing up to $8.5 million to NSW to ensure it’s meeting national benchmarks, through the development of landscape-scale approval pathways like the strategic assessment. “We believe in a strong and environmentally sustainable future for the New South Wales forestry industry, and we look forward to continuing work with the Minns Government on this.” The RFAs in NSW cover forests in Eden, the North-East and Southern NSW and set obligations and commitments for forest management. The assessment will consider the impacts from forestry operations on nationally significant animals, plants, habitats and places to ensure they are appropriately identified and managed. From 1 July 2027, forestry operations taking place in RFAs will need to comply with the same rules and standards as other industries covered under the EPBC Act. The NSW Government is now releasing for public consultation the draft terms of reference for the strategic assessment. Once the strategic assessment is complete, the NSW Government will work on a long-term bilateral agreement with the Australian Government to accredit NSW forestry operations. The Minns Labor Government is continuing to develop a Forestry Industry Action Plan to ensure a sustainable forestry industry that is aligned with environmental and economic priorities. Consultation commenced on 18 September 2026 and finishes on 16 October 2026. The assessment will be informed by scientific evidence, spatial and environmental data, and stakeholder input. The Australian and NSW governments have released a draft Terms of Reference outlining the proposed scope, process, information requirements and expected outputs for the assessment. Have your say at https://www.nsw.gov.au/have-your-say/strategic-assessment-of-forestry-rfas

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