The Finnish forest industry managed to
purchase a total of 5.3 million cubic metres of wood from privately
owned domestic forests in August.
The industry’s wood supply situation remains dire even though the
August purchase amount increased almost threefold from July. The
aggregate purchase volume for January-August, 17.4 million cubic
metres, is still substantially less than normal. If the forest
industry’s raw material needs are to be satisfied with domestic wood,
annual procurements from private forests must at least triple.
The industry is still in need of large amounts of pulpwood in
particular. The forest industry’s January-August pine pulpwood
purchases were 24% and birch pulpwood purchases 39% higher than normal.
Spruce pulpwood purchases stood at around 75% of the normal five-year
average. Birch log purchases came to around 90% of the normal level,
but purchases of pine and spruce logs were down by almost 50%. Weak
demand for sawn timber on the global markets and the high price of wood
continue to slow down log sales. The tax-free status granted to income
from first-thinning operations finished at the end of August and this
livened up timber sales, especially during the last week of August.
Price of wood remains high
Stumpage prices remained largely unchanged from July. The average
stumpage price of pine and spruce logs was 58 per cubic metre and the
average price of birch logs was 49 per cubic metre. Average pine and
birch pulpwood stumpage prices were 16-17 per cubic metre and the
stumpage price of spruce pulpwood was 22 per cubic metre. Prices remain
considerably higher than in 2006, the last normal year for timber
sales. Softwood logs are 17-21%, birch logs 14%, pine and birch
pulpwood 25–27% and spruce pulpwood 3% dearer than in August 2006.
One third of roundwood sales are purchases for delivery
The market situation for delivery sales, i.e. timber harvested by
forest owners themselves, remains good. Over one third of all
procurements were purchases for delivery in January-August, when they
accounted for only 14% of all sales in the corresponding period of
2007.
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