There is no question that we are in challenging times, albeit very different from the last downturn we saw in 2008/2009. Sawlog demand is at an all-time low with prices continuing to fall whilst small roundwood demand appears to be holding up well driven by strong demand for bio-mass and to some extend by a shortage, at least perceived, of sawmill co-products. This has led to a position where standing sale prices are holding up well with little change from a year ago. It is hard to reconcile this with the sawmill proijessor position and can only point to the fact that small round prices have held up and indeed risen. We are clearly in a different sort of downturn than previously experienced, which has always been led by exchange rates and sawlog prices whilst this time around the impact of the importance of biomass as a product cannot be underestimated.
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