Continuing the discussion from Welcome to Pakira Pub!
Good afternoon Pakira partners, my name is Neill Gibson and I have been involved with the lumber industry for more than 20 years. I am based in Quebec City and am responsible for sales at VAB - Timber Automation, supplier of optimisation equipment for sawmills and planer mills in both softwood and hardwood. After spending over 15 years in the actual sales of lumber and value added products such as siding and fencing, I made the move to the equipment side of the business because today industry needs to increase automation to compete. I look forward to any future communications and if there are any specific questions about VAB products, feel free to reach out to me directly at neill.gibson@timberna.com . Cheers
Welcome to the community @Neill_Gibson , I had no idea you had a background in lumber sales before VAB, how interesting! Couldn’t agree more, American companies need to continue investing in technology to remain competitive. There is a night and day difference between the sticks I see from the US (room for improvement) vs Euro (beautiful products). Is that due to automation?
To be honest Andrew, the difference in Europe starts with the trees. They do not manage forests like we do and I have had European producers visit north of the border who were completely stunned by the “natural forests” we have here. Imagine in parts of Scandinavia, when seedlings are planted the trees location, species, etc. are added to a data base and technology has gotten to the point where when it comes time to harvest, the machinery is sent via GPS location to harvest specific trees according to their profile, etc. Europe is a whole other world. Because of this, sawmills do not produce random products, they accumulate logs of specific characteristics so that when they do a production run, the sawmill system doesn’t need to waste time adjusting patterns, they run hard and fast producing according to the logs and this means that the product coming out is rough sawn square on all sides. In Europe wood products are no different than farming corn, and other agricultural crops, except for the grow time… We have a long way to go to bring N-A lumber to the levels of most European producers. Automation & optimization have a part to play but the mentality has to change as well.
Reading about the efficiency of European forests and harvesting is fascinating! The order and structure of these Scandinavian forests must be a sight to behold when it comes to harvesting and running. I
Separately, do you know if our “natural forests” are any healthier than what they have across Europe? I do not hear much about disease coming from them and their sticks are always so clear.
Andrew, the debate between natural and cultivated forests has been an issue for decades. I believe that the notion of monocultural plantations is starting to evolve towards multi species but not everyone has adopted the practice. There are so many variables to consider that the process of evolution will take time but it appears obvious this early in the process that there are definite advantages. In terms of the quality, because the industry doesn’t operate on a fixed product blend, the fiber goes to the market with the best and most consistent return. European mills rarely have inventory of finished products that is unsold. They produce according to the order file whereas in North America, for the most part mills simply try to produce as much volume as possible of the same basket of products and only consider changing their focus when inventories stop moving. I liken it too the following models: in Europe sales drive production whereas in North America, production drives sales.
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This is fascinating and begins to explain why some foreign markets are so hard to understand. You are saying that European mills most often sell before they produce, correct? Do you know how that is structured? Is most of their business quarterly contracts or something?
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Recently I was speaking to a Wood Trader in the New Zealand market and he described how their system is similar to the European system. In New Zealand there is very little open market wood and printing prices on wood is illegal (https://comcom.govt.nz/business/dealing-with-typical-situations/meeting-with-competitors-to-discuss-pricing )
I’ll pull Todd in here… I’d love to get his perspective on this on how New Zealand compares!https://www.linkedin.com/in/todd-grantham-771b0b164/
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The answer is simply the US owned federal lands under control of the USFS and the BLM rely on political pressures, and activist groups, in its management of its forest land’s stewardship. Contrary to the mess on these federal lands are the private sector of large and small corporate holdings that clearly practice far better forest management than its federal counterparts resulting in less disease, infestations of insects, fire damage, etc.
Europe’s governmental owned lands, as well as privately owned, have always been the pillar of successful forest management, treating their lands with the same care as US private sector companies do.
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