AF&PA's August Printing-Writing report shows total US printing-writing paper shipments down 7% y/y, with inventories up 1% from July; July net imports rose 26% y/y (uncoated freesheet +38%, coated freesheet +51%, mechanical +13%) — softening domestic demand alongside rising import volumes across every major grade (PULPAPERnews)
Forestry & Timber
Pentarch will close its Kyogle hardwood sawmill in NSW's Northern Rivers (the former Boral mill) at the end of October, making 25 workers redundant and keeping five on for about a month of decommissioning; the union blames the Great Koala National Park moratorium ("the wood supply stopped the day the koala park was announced"), making Kyogle the third Pentarch site hit after Koolkhan (38 stood down) and Herons Creek (closed July), though Pentarch had reported log shortfalls before the moratorium and declined to comment (Timberbiz, Wood Central)
US logs and wood products are on the list of goods for reciprocal tariff cuts under the new US–China "Board of Trade" framework covering ~US$30B of goods in each direction; 32 lawmakers want finished lumber prioritised over raw logs so China cannot simply process American logs locally (US hardwood log exports to China: US$261.8M Jan–Jul vs. US$433.7M a year earlier; hardwood lumber to China has fallen from ~US$1.5B/yr to US$701M) (Wood Central)
Germany's Bundesrat voted Friday to require that forest cooperatives' right to file a single collective EUDR due-diligence declaration be written into the federal implementing act rather than left to ministry rules, and that small owners may give postal addresses instead of GPS coordinates; Germany has ~760,000 private forest owners, ~700,000 of them under 10 ha, and the Bundestag votes next ahead of the Dec. 30 start (Wood Central, Fordaq)
Port Nelson (NZ) handled a record 1.76M t of export logs (+66% y/y) in its latest financial year as windthrow salvage from ~10,000 ha of storm-damaged Nelson Tasman plantations and the closure of Carter Holt Harvey's Eves Valley sawmill pushed logs to export; underlying profit rose 79% to NZ$12.7M on revenue of NZ$96.3M (+15%), forestry is now 54% of cargo, and the port expects volumes to normalise as salvage eases from late 2026 (Wood Central)
Update: former CSIRO chief research scientist John Raison and FWCA chair Steve Dobbyns wrote to Premier Minns and federal ministers arguing NSW's $1.5B Great Koala National Park carbon case assumes forest management costs of $15.90/ha/yr against Forestry Corporation's ~$24 and National Parks' historical $91–98, which would cut the claimed 15-year net income from $1.136B to ~$974M; they also flag reliance on ACCU prices reaching $67 by 2030 (now $38.65) and possible 40–100% over-crediting (Wood Central)
Finland's industrial roundwood harvest was 5.2M m³ in August (−1% y/y; sawlogs 2.4M m³ +1%, pulpwood 2.8M m³ −2%), 3% below the five-year August average; Jan–Aug harvest is 38.2M m³ (−4%) and energywood 4.2M m³ (−19%), with private-forest volumes down 3% and industry/state forests up 9% (Fordaq)
CRT Building Products has shut its 62-year-old timber truss and frame factory in Mitchell, Canberra, cutting 20 jobs, citing high timber costs since the 2019 bushfires, cheaper steel competition, weak standalone-home demand and the ACT's shift to high-rise; Canberra was once ~95% timber frame and CRT will continue with its Steeline steel and Colorbond operations (Timberbiz)
Lukashenko ordered Belarus to lift harvest volumes and run mills longer rather than build new ones, and told machinery maker Amkodor (52% of the national harvesting fleet, 120 machines/yr rising to 250) to push sales into Russia's Arkhangelsk region; Belarus exports 1M+ m³ of timber a year, mostly to China, with the EU import ban in place since 2022 (Wood Central)
IKEA's Ingka Investments says it is exploring its first wood-waste recycling investment under its €1B recycling ambition, arguing wood should be recycled rather than burned for energy; Inter IKEA targets at least one-third recycled wood in wood-based products by 2030, and Ingka owns 495,000 ha of forest across seven countries (Wood Central)
Co-generation at Mills
Canson and ENGIE inaugurated a ~€6M biomass boiler at Canson's Saint-Marcel-lès-Annonay specialty paper mill in France (€2M from ADEME under France 2030), burning wood chips and shredded pallets sourced within ~100 km; after six months of commissioning it has hit performance targets and is projected to cut the site's energy-related greenhouse gas emissions by 89% while sharply reducing natural gas use (Papnews)
Wood Pellets
Tasmania's draft data-centre guidelines allow AI data centres to consider forestry residues alongside batteries and hydrogen for backup power, with feedback closing in two weeks and final guidelines due by year-end; Sustainable Timber Tasmania is separately tendering ~100,000 t/yr of biomass (closing early November, supply from early 2027), and the Greens and Bob Brown Foundation warn plantation supply is too thin and native-forest biomass would fill the gap (Wood Central)
Industry Technology Vendors
Comact — Launched Comact Cutting Solutions, consolidating Smith Sawmill Service, Oleson Saw Technology, Checkmate Precision Cutting Tools and its BLADE brand into one organisation covering circular saws, bandsaws, knives, guides, filing-room equipment and consumables, and serving as exclusive US dealer for ISELI filing-room machinery; each brand keeps its identity and customer relationships (Timber Processing, International Forest Industries)
Seppi — Released the F50 turbo forestry mulcher, an evolution of the Starforst for 200–350 hp tractors: 210–260 cm working width, ~3,400 kg, 63–77 V-LOCK rotor tools, S420 steel frame with AR400 wear parts and a hydrodynamic coupling with M-TURBO protection for land clearing and large-diameter wood and stumps (Timberbiz)
