Timber's market potential

John Kissock (Scottish Forestry & Timber Technology Advisory Group): Primarily we must recognise we have to spend more as an industry on research and development. Rather than just selling timber, we must provide systems to solve problems. The massive task of upgrading the UK’s old housing stock is a huge opportunity, for instance, but we have to be innovative in the way we go about it and provide solutions. We are moving forward, though. At Napier University we have a cross-industry working group undertaking a £150,000 proof of concept programme into producing CLT out of UK timber. We also have the Wood Innovation Gateway at Napier working with the industry to develop other new uses for the material. Companies bring their ideas along, and Napier puts them through proof testing. But in the future, to take this further, the structure of the industry must change. There will have to be more joint projects with customers so that we provide precisely the solutions they require. One role of the SFTTAG is to interact with the Scottish Construction Forum to develop ideas, and one of the main issues raised at a recent meeting was the refurbishing of existing housing stock.

Richard Harris (University of Bath): In terms of construction materials, timber is advancing. The reason that CLT has been successful in new build is not because in itself it’s a valuable product, but because it comes to site as a prefabricated element, made to very close tolerances. These in turn permit the air tightness and insulation levels that energy performance legislation is increasingly demanding of new building. And other industries haven’t got anywhere near where timber is in terms of supplying such products.

But the trouble is, these innovative timber solutions are mainly coming from abroad. That needs to change and one model for how it can happen is, perhaps, the Structural Timber Innovation Company in New Zealand. This is an operation created by market competitors with academic and design partners to provide complete solutions to clients. We have to see expertise coming together like this for the benefit of the industry as a whole, identifying market gaps and seeing how they can be filled.

Mark Bowers (UCM): I agree we need to be developing and using more of these materials like glulam and moving more into prefabrication. Where I see the difficulty is not in terms of the technology or practicalities, but on the commercial side. The UK timber trade is based on an import model and, even where we can develop products like glulam from UK material, there is a tendency for the import guys to fight against them because its route to market is different and excludes them. To really progress, develop, diversify and promote the product better as an industry, the whole fragmented, traditional nature of our distribution has to be taken apart and rebuilt. We’ve seen how the trade reacts to change with the increased volume of lumber coming out of Scotland. The reaction was to undermine it by finding even cheaper sources.

Peter Latham (James Latham plc): Getting the cross-industry collaboration we need will be difficult. If you compare us with the rest of Europe, we’re not very clubbable with our competitors. But we have to overcome this to promote our material and develop the market. Take the example of laminated hardwood window sections. Currently everyone promotes different sizes. But logically, for all our benefit, to develop the business, cut waste and costs, we should get together and say, “these are the standard sections we’re all going to jointly market”.

John White (Timber Trade Federation): The issue in this industry, which is largely small- to medium-sized companies, is that few players have the critical mass to make this sort of cross-industry collaboration happen. That’s why our representative bodies have such an important role to play to facilitate the conversations and co-operation and help make the arguments. We are progressing here. The reinvigoration of Wood for Good and its adoption of more of a representative role is promising. As is the way our various trade bodies are coalescing around some core pan-industry themes. But it’s still hard work! We also clearly need to put more of our people through education and training. The skills aren’t here at the moment to aid the innovation.

Sheam Satkuru-Granzella (Malaysian Timber Council): A key area we all still need to address is the value we as an industry attach to our product and the price we’re willing to pay for it. Given pressure on our own and global supplies, the Malaysian industry is innovating, developing new and more technical products – even glulam – to make better use of the resource. The struggle is getting the market to pay a fair price for these more highly manufactured, higher spec products. For instance, we’ve been doing laminated window components for a while, but trying to market them is a nightmare. People say they want the best, but they’re still not willing to pay for it.

Andrew Scoones (Building Centre): From our experience at the Building Centre, I’d say that the UK building products sector generally is struggling to achieve the cross-industry co-operation needed to develop the new solutions and systems needed for sustainable, low carbon housing. Very few of the companies showing their innovative products at the Centre are now UK based.

There is also the problem of supply chain obstacles to these systems when they are developed. Big purchasers are tied into big suppliers who say, if you don’t buy our plasterboard as well as our cement, for instance, you’re penalised on price – and price is king. It makes it difficult for innovative solutions to break into the chain.

RH: Another area where this industry increasingly needs to collaborate is in leveraging government money for research and development. Despite all the cuts, it hasn’t stopped spending money in this area, but more than ever its insisting on industry co-operation and partnering and match funding.

We are also not as active and involved as we should be in Europe, getting involved in pan-EU development projects – for example there’s a large amount of innovation there currently in cladding systems – or participating in development of codes and standards.

MB: Another challenge if we’re going to get these new, technical engineered products taken up across the market is educating the builders. Given their relatively low skills base, especially in the RMI market, and sheer numbers, it’s an enormous job. Maybe another solution is to penetrate other parts of the timber market that are technically more advanced and better understand these products and through them ultimately penetrate construction too.

AS: You should also be targeting these high quality, engineered products at the consultancy and specifier sector. That’s our target at the Building Centre and we reach it through presentations and technical seminars. There’s still great potential for you on the materials and supply side to build that conversation.

JK: From my experience at James Jones, developing the JJI-joist was a real education. It had to be sold in a completely different way to our traditional product. It meant training our own people in the detail of the product, greater customer support and education and development of software to ensure proper use of the product. But this is precisely the sort of thing that has to happen in our industry.

Geoff Rhodes (Coillte Panel Products): We also need to raise market expectations of timber by changing the language we use. There’s a lot of technology and science behind timber and if we can communicate that to the specifiers, particularly through their education process, we can change our whole value proposition. We can move on from it being just the price code and it’s so much per cubic metre.

RH: And you do have a great opportunity here because your audience is now very receptive. Student architects and engineers are increasingly interested in using timber. What would be particularly beneficial to you and us would be for you to provide work experience for students. We train engineers as generalists, but to work with timber they need specialist experience and learning, which a work attachment could help provide. It could influence a student’s outlook forever.