Until the autumn of last year traders and producers would have been willing to buy wood at basically any price. The raw material was in short supply, following the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, and the demand from processing companies (for construction and furniture, but also for industrial packaging) was dizzying.<\/p>\n
Prices halved across Europe<\/strong><\/p>\n One year ago pellets had reached the price of 600 euros per ton, the lumber for packaging 400\/480 euros, the laminated reached 1,000\/1,100 euros per cubic meter. \u00abToday prices, on average, have halved. Italian sawmills are struggling with an enormous quantity of product that they are unable to sell\", says Francesco Zanzotto , trader specialized in wood, confirming a downward trend in wood prices which began already in the second half of the year but which, for about a this month, has seen a strong acceleration, with values \u200b\u200bhalved (for example, uncut fir wood fell to 34.2 euros per cubic meter in the third quarter, compared to 75 euros in 2022). A situation that affects all of Europe and which is creating significant losses for sawmills, which have warehouses or yards full of logs purchased when prices were high, and now find themselves effectively selling off the goods.<\/p>\n Vaia and the bark beetle<\/strong><\/p>\n At the origin of this phenomenon, at least as far as Italy is concerned, there is still a long tail of the effects of Vaia, the storm that five years ago felled around 14 million trees from Friuli-Venezia Giulia to Lombardy, but above all in Veneto and Trentino. Storms of this kind, even much more violent ones, are not rare in Central Europe, so much so that, in managing the balance between supply and demand, forest managers take into account a certain quantity of damaged wood. \u00abIf the sampling takes place quickly, the material is still of good quality, comparable to that of standing trees\u00bb, explains Alessandro Calcaterra, president of Fedecomlegno, the FederlegnoArredo association that represents traders and importers.<\/p>\n The problem, in the case of Vaia, is that it took a long time, both due to the difficult conditions of safety and accessibility to the fallen plants, and because historically in Italy there is no structured forest supply chain for similar quantities, as has long been reported operators and companies in the wood-furniture supply chain, forced to purchase 80% of the wood they transform abroad.<\/p>\n Italian sawmills in trouble<\/strong><\/p>\n The sawmills have remained somewhat crushed in this imbalance between supply and demand, aggravated by the fact that the bark beetle has started to attack even healthy plants, so the prices of fresh, unaffected wood have instead increased. \u00abBut the market no longer absorbs these values\u00bb, explains Luigi Sartori, owner of Sartorilegno in Trento, one of the largest Italian sawmills. \u00abRevenues and margins have collapsed for everyone, even for our competitors \u2013 adds Sartori -. In our case we should be able to close the year with break-even revenues, thanks to the long queue of orders from our customers, which come from an excellent two-year period, and thanks to the diversification of the company, which has also been producing semi-finished products for some years\". But 2024 promises to be difficult: the slowdown of the world economy, the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, the rise in interest rates and, in Italy, the weakening of housing incentives, are slowing down demand in construction and construction. furniture.<\/p>\n Forecasts<\/strong><\/p>\n This slowdown is the main cause of the declines in wood prices, according to Calcaterra. \u00abThe supply was balanced on the market demand, but the slowdown was faster than expected\u00bb, he explains. This difficult situation should continue into 2024, \u00abbut in the medium-long term the demand for wood will restart, also favored by European policies for sustainable construction\u00bb, says Calcaterra. As far as timber prices are concerned, it is difficult to make immediate predictions. \u00abI expect a progressive normalization of the market \u2013 says Zanzotto \u2013. We are in fact witnessing a change on the supply front: sawmills are adapting to the market and are producing less, therefore I believe that within 2-3 months the situation should rebalance, both from the point of view of quantities and of prices\".<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Until the autumn of last year traders and producers would have been willing to buy wood at basically any price. The raw material was in short supply, following the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, and the demand from processing … Continue reading