Demand for Sawtimber, Solidwood Products

U.S.

• CReal prices of softwood lumber and softwood sawtimber are expected to rise steadily from current levels until 2010 to 2015, then stabilize or fall in subsequent periods.
• CThere is expected to be a reduction in harvests of timber from pubic lands in all U.S. regions, but particularly in the West.
• CThere is a limited ability of private timber owners in the West to sustain increased harvest due to limited merchantable growing inventories.
• CLumber demand in 1995 again reached earlier high levels of 1987 and is expected to remain at this level until 2040.
• CMaturation of young-growth forests on both industrial and non-industrial lands in the South is expected to lead to increases in softwood timber cuts, until 2040.
• CPrice increases in solidwood products and sawtimber until 2010 appear to be nearly inevitable, unless there is some major reduction in timber demand, as might occur with increasing substitution of competing products for solidwood products, or with higher levels of recycling.
• CThe South will be the major source of any expansion in softwood timber supply for the next 50 years.  If high planting rates in the South continue as expected, real product and timber prices will stabilize, and in some cases decline, after 2020.
• CRising real prices for hardwood lumber are caused by declining inventory trends which, in turn, result from land conversion to softwoods, limited intensity of hardwood silviculture, and large increases in demands for pulpwood until 2040.