North America's critical fibre basket, in British Columbia, managed to avoid significant forest fire this year, writes Keta Kosman in Madison’s Lumber Reporter
https://madisonsreport.com.
While the danger season is by no means over, this latest rain combined with cooler temperatures at night likely mean BC's timber supply is safe from at least that threat for another year.
Traders of dimension lumber and panel products told Madison's Lumber Reporter this week that business continued brisk in advance of the Labour Day long weekend. While sales volumes remained lower than they had been prior to the US home building run-up, in 2004, steady demand from both US and overseas customers was enough to keep solid wood commodity prices generally flat.
Inventories in the field remain quite low, forcing customers back to suppliers every few days with fresh orders. It seems, at least for now, that the stubborn reluctance of end-users to truly increase inventory -- prompted by fears of yet another price plunge -- continues to be the prevalent attitude. Producers mulled over this puzzling mentality even as they filled order books with encouraging regularity.
Some sawmills reported order files well into mid-September, indicating momentum of current strong prices might be here to stay into autumn. The Labour Day long weekend, the final vacation blow-out for families before school starts, is often a harbinger of seasonal slow-down in lumber buying. Traders were pleased that prices this week remained firm, but expressed caution that next week might precipitate a drop.
Conversely, it seems reloads, stocking wholesalers, and large home builders in the US will still need to buy wood for housing projects already in the works or announced for September.
Restrictions on heavy equipment in the back country, brief as they were this year, have been lifted on the west coast. Most producers in Canada and the US express confidence that log supplies at their mills are sufficient to satisfy customer needs through October.
With most of the summer's produce having been moved to market destinations, transportation generally ran smoothly for Canadian sawmills. Rail cars arrived with acceptable timeliness, and trucks were relatively easy to find. Parts of Quebec, however, have proved to be such a nightmare in transporting wood products that some veteran traders have recently simply refused to do business in those locations.
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Keta Kosman
Publisher
Madison's Lumber Reporter
604 984-6838
www.madisonsreport.com