Plywood and OSB – such key products in the UK timber trade – have experiened a bumpy ride in the recent trading cycle.
One trader TTJ spoke to had just returned from a visit to mills in China with some bad news about the Chinese construction economy.
“Housebuilding and construction in China are at an all-time low,” he said. “I saw many high-rise blocks standing empty: Builders are going bust and deposits are being lost. They used to sell before they were built.”
This is obviously bad news for the plywood producers, but their plywood also goes into furniture, which is being sold to the US and, given the tariffs imposed by President Trump, that business has also dropped severely.
“The whole supply chain is down,” said the trader. “One of our biggest suppliers has diversified into other markets such as South America (though not Brazil), selling softwood plywood made from Chinese pine and some New Zealand radiata pine.”
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