Tilbury is a major port for forest products and is the UK’s leading port for plywood imports. The port is seeing growing throughput of building materials including timber and plywood and supports a range of import modes including breakbulk, containers and ro-ro. Forth Ports, which owns the Port of Tilbury has invested heavily in mobile cranes and landside equipment.
Overall, Tilbury handles in excess of three million tonnes of forest products annually (including paper products) across 2.5 million ft2 of warehouse and outside space.
“The port’s historical forest products business includes Travis Perkins, Meyers and James Latham, with Grimaldi breakbulk vessels coming in from South America and Africa, and Saga Welco breakbulk vessels shipping from South-east Asia,” said Paul Dale, senior asset manager at the Port of Tilbury.
“Tilbury, through its geographic location is strategically located, with a great deal of history dealing with sheet materials, timber and pulp/paper to offer streamlined supply chain and value added services for our customers,” added Mr Dale.
“Forest products are core business for the port and long may that continue. We are the largest importer of the combined forest products trade in the UK, with established trade routes for all origins, including the Baltic states, Scandinavia, Europe, South-east Asia and South and North America.”
In terms of solid wood, UPM, Consolidated Timber Holdings (CTH) and its group of companies, and L&G Forest Products are large volume users of Tilbury. On the sheet material side, UPM, CTH and its group of companies, Meyer Timber, International Plywood, Panel Supplies, Caledonian Plywood, Lathams, Travis Perkins and Altripan all have a significant presence.
Tilbury has a wealth of experience and expertise in supporting companies such as CTH, which has just celebrated its 50th anniversary trading with the Port of Tilbury.
The port is seeing more ro-ro cargo, according to Mr Dale, but continues to support the import of multimodal routing options. This has allowed its customers to expand logistics operations in southern England and provide a 24-hour delivery distribution centre at Tilbury to meet tighter order timescales.
“Tilbury will continue to tailor our operations to our customers’ needs,” said Mr Dale. “You only have to look at where the majority of construction spend in the UK is – London. This positions Tilbury as an excellent location to support the growth and it will continue to be an attractive shipping destination for forest product imports.
