The alternative title for this blog should be “The Failure of Timber Markets”.
Back in August last year I received an email from a blackwood grower in New Zealand who had a blackwood plantation ready to harvest. He was looking for buyers.
Here is his latest email. It makes for depressing reading.
Hi Gordon,
Just wanted to share with you a brief summary of our experience trying to sell tasmanian blackwoods in nz.. its been a difficult and frustrating road. Feel free to share if you like.
So we have reached out to dozens of sawmills, brokers etc in nz with details of our small but ready to fell forest.
(Approx 200-300 trees, 35 years old, 6-8m clear trunks with a DBH between 600-800mm)
Several have been great with communication but the price offers have been truly abysmal..
We are getting an offer with a rough average price of NZ $200/ton for the logs delivered to the mill… given freight costs etc this would end up closer to $150/ton
It’s been quite a shock as this is even lower than we would receive in firewood prices..
So we now will consider looking into purchasing a mill and milling/drying etc ourselves but given the amount of work involved we may yet reach the conclusion that simply selling this beautiful timber as firewood is the better option.
A rather sad outcome given the hard work, love and dedication my father has poured into this forestry project over 35 years.
The disparity between what the consumer is asked to pay and what the growers are offered is just too big.. I have sympathy for the builder or house owner trying to put in beautiful blackwood flooring and being quoted tens of thousands of dollars while the price given to growers is a few hundred.
Once this is finally behind us next will come the question of what to plant next? Given the prices for blackwoods I can’t justify doing it again so we will perhaps give up on this industry and continue instead with firewood production which is selling for $300-$500 per ton.
Such a sad end to a wonderful project, the logs being mostly 8m clear will produce beautiful flooring, tables, desks etc but may never be given the chance to become anything more than ash in someone’s fireplace.
Thank you for your emails over the last year your work is appreciated and your site a wealth of knowledge.
Kindest regards
Jamie
Unfortunately Jamie’s experience is not unusual. In New Zealand, and to a much lesser extent in Australia, farmers have been planting and growing durable and decorative hardwoods and softwoods in the hope of one day selling their logs/timber into an appreciative timber market. After many decades that appreciative timber market is yet to appear. The hopes and dreams of those farmers are been destroyed.
Neither here in Australia nor in New Zealand has proper functioning timber markets ever developed.
Here in Australia there are 10,000’s of businesses that rely on a supply of durable and decorative timbers and I have yet to find a single business that expresses any interest in their future timber supply.
Trees take a while to grow. Much forward planning and work is needed if any timber will be available in the future. And 10,000s of businesses couldn’t care less. Is it wilful ignorance or head in the sand?
Even Australia’s biggest timber retailer @Bunnings expresses zero interest in the future supply of timber.
The timber market is heading for a catastrophic collapse in a few years time. That is 100% guaranteed. All decorative and durable timbers will have to be imported, assuming they are even available. Public native welfare forestry will end in Australia. That is 100% guaranteed.
After decades of hard work and waiting it would be an absolute travesty to see Jamie’s blackwood timber resource turned into firewood, and his father’s legacy destroyed. But that common story seems to be what the timber market wishes. The result of wilful ignorance!
The only future for durable and decorative hardwood and softwood timbers is with farm forestry. Fully commercial and profitable. That wont happen until the timber market wakes up!
TAKE HOME MESSAGE:
WAKE UP TIMBER MARKET!!!
Tasmanian Blackwood Growers Cooperative 