Title: Changing Markets for Hardwood Roundwood

Author: Luppold, William; Prestemon, Jeffrey P.; Schuler, Albert

Year: 2002

Publication: P. 96-100 in D. Zhang (ed.), Proceedings of the 2001 Southern Forest Economics Workshop, March 28-29, 2001, Atlanta, Georgia, School of Forestry and Wildlife Sciences, Auburn University. 203 p.

Abstract: Traditionally, hardwood roundwood has been used to produce lumber, cabinet plywood, and veneer. Hardwoods also have been a major part of the pulpwood consumption in the northern tier of the eastern United States since the early 1960?s, while southern pines have been the predominant species used in southern tier states. However, since the 1960's there has been a steady increase in the consumption of hardwood pulpwood in the East. During the mid 1980?s, hardwood roundwood also started to be used for the production of engineered wood. By the early 1990's, the volume of hardwood roundwood consumed by the pulp and EWPs industries exceeded the volume of roundwood consumed by the hardwood lumber industry. The consumption of eastern hardwood roundwood has increased dramatically in part because there are substantial hardwood resources to support this increase. Other factors that have influenced the increase include declining volumes of southern softwood growing stock, reduction in the sale of softwood timber from National Forests, and rising demand for homes and paper. These factors caused the price of softwood roundwood to escalate and provided the impetus needed to develop new technologies to manufacture products from less expensive hardwood roundwood. Still, changes in hardwood roundwood consumption have varied by region. In this paper we analyze changes in hardwood roundwood consumption on a regional level and how they were influenced by increasing demand for wood-based materials, increased volumes of hardwood inventories, and changes in technology.