CSIRO Announces Research Group Reorganisation, Again

A3P, the national body representing Australia’s plantation products and paper industry, has expressed concern over the announcement of another reorganisation of the Forest Fibre Science group in CSIRO, with 28 possible redundancies. After regular "re-organisations" in recent years, concerns over capacity and staff morale have led industry to voice their view that CSIRO management lack commitment to the sector. At a time when overseas researchers continue to develop new opportunities for wood in energy, chemical and traditional products to replace fossil based feedstocks, A3P believes Australia's premier research organisation shows little leadership in the forest, wood products and paper sectors. A3P has urged Senator Carr as the Minister responsible for CSIRO, the pulp and paper sector and innovation, to re-allocate the $7 million annual savings from the CSIRO reorganisation to specific innovation opportunities for the forestry and paper manufacturing industries.

(Source: A3P)

Contractors Invited for ACoP Review

A project is being run this year to review the Department of Labour Approved Code of Practice for Safety and Health in Forest Operations and 18 FITEC Best Practice Guidelines.

This project is being run by:
FITEC – Forest industries Training and Education Council
FOA – Forest Owners Association
FICA – Forest Industry Contractors Association
DoL – Department of Labour
ACC – Accident Compensation Corporation
Southern Wood Council
Eastland Wood Council
Northern Safety Forum

As part of the process to determine the format and content of the various documents, the project team has designed a survey to see how much the documents are used, what they are used for and how they could be used in the future. They are keen to get feedback from as many industry people as possible to ensure this review results in a set of documents that will be of value to all users.

Please take 10 minutes to complete the survey by clicking here

The project steering committee would like to thank you in anticipation for your time and expert input.

SAFETY CORNER - Crush Between Drawbar and Chasis

Accident Detail
The trailer had been lifted off the truck and lowered to the ground to allow the driver to swing the drawbar to connect to the truck. During this process the driver removed the lock pin to swing the drawbar. He then went to swing it around to secure it ready to connect to the truck. In doing this he did not have full control and the drawbar swung in the opposite direction. When trying to correct this he placed his hand between the drawbar and trailer chassis. The result was a crushed hand and broken fingers with time off work and the hand in plaster.

Solutions/Controls

West Coast Forestry Strategy Released

Last week, Forestry Minister David Carter released the Government's future strategy for the Crown's West Coast plantation forests, which aims to keep as much production and employment on the Coast as possible. "This strategy marks a way forward for an industry that suffered years of broken promises and neglect under the previous Labour Government," says Mr Carter. "The aim to have Crown-owned West Coast forestry break even within five years is huge progress, given the mess that this Government inherited."

The release of the strategy follows a full review of the forests and supporting industry undertaken by the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry's Crown Forestry unit. This was on the back of the transfer of the former Timberlands West Coast forests to the Crown in January 2009 after the State Owned Enterprise's Board advised the previous Government it could no longer operate profitably.

"Currently 65% of logs from West Coast forests leave the area unprocessed. The strategy aims to improve that situation so that jobs and profit can be retained on the Coast," says Mr Carter. "Crown Forestry is required to maintain a fully commercial focus in its forestry activities, so there will need to be changes to the way forestry processing happens at present."

The strategy includes improving financial returns through increased on-Coast sales of unpruned logs, rationalisation of the estate to remove the most remote and least productive areas, and investigating outright sale of these forests in conjunction with landowner Ngai Tahu, which has a right of first refusal. "This may well mean some rationalisation of sawmilling occurs, but the overall aim is to make West Coast forestry economically sustainable, preserving livelihoods in the long term," Mr Carter says.

US-based Companies Bidding for Queensland Asset

Bloomberg has reported that US-based Hancock Natural Resource Group Inc., Global Forest Partners LP and Rayonier Inc. are among the top international contenders submitting bids to acquire Forestry Plantations Queensland, the first of several state asset to be sold under a privatization program announced in June 2009 by Queensland Premier Anna Bligh. The price tag the government put on the forestry asset last June was around AUD$500 million, which Bligh said at the time was to help keep the state’s massive building program going.

A separate report in the North Queensland Register, said Harvard Endowment Fund was believed to have shown an interest, but walked, and that a Chinese consortium could be in the mix. However, the Register said a big timber fund was the most likely buyer.

Boston, Massachusetts, based Hancock Natural Resource Group, Inc., is the parent company of Hancock Timber Resource Group (HTRG), the largest US-based timberland investment management organization managing more than 4.5 million acres of timberland globally, with clients' lands in North America, Brazil, New Zealand and Australia.

New Hampshire-based Global Forest Partners (GFP) acquired the forestry assets of failed Australian agribusiness Timbercorp Ltd last year; that AUD$345 million transaction involving GFP unit Australian Bluegum Plantations reportedly included nearly 100,000 hectares of eucalyptus plantations in the Green Triangle in Victoria, and in the Great Southern region of Western Australia.

The sale is expected to complete by June.

(Source: www.forestweb.com)

Tenon Breaks Even as China Demand Grows

Tenon Ltd., the specialty wood products manufacturer, broke even in the first half of the year, including financing expenses, as the weak U.S. housing market dragged on earnings. Operating profit fell to US$2 million in the six months ended December, from US$3 million a year earlier, the company said in a statement last week. Financing costs of US$2 million wiped out the profit.

The absence of a net profit belies the activity at its Taupo-based plant, which is humming as Tenon fills booming orders from China, prompting the company to move to continuous four-shift operations. The company claimed in its first-half commentary that it was "the only grade-sawing mill in the world operating on a 24/7 rotation in today's operating climate".

The result was "an excellent achievement in a continuing difficult operating environment," chairman Luke Moriarty said. Tenon's performance is highly correlated to activity in the U.S. housing market, which Tenon expects "will turn positive” in calendar 2010. Kiwi dollar volatility was marked in the period, but the company adopted a hedging strategy that preserved $600,000 of value.

75 Million Tons of Woody Biomass Consumed Worldwide

The global pulp and paper industry has substantially increased its use of woody biomass for energy the past few years, which has consequently reduced dependence on fossil fuels, reports the Wood Resource Quarterly. Since 2006, energy generated from biomass has gone up over 50%, last year accounting for 18% of the total energy consumption by this industry sector.

Global consumption of biomass increased by 51% between 2006 and 2009.
The annual consumption of biomass used for energy generation by the global pulp industry in 2009 was an estimated 75 million tons. While the biggest increases have occurred in Latin America and Asia/Oceania, mills in North America and Europe are still the largest users of biomass material. Not surprisingly, the leading biomass-consuming countries by volume are regions with large areas of forests, including Canada, the US, Brazil and Sweden. Perhaps somewhat unexpectedly, pulp mills in Finland, New Zealand, Australia, France and Germany have consumed fairly small volumes of biomass up until now, as reported in the Wood Resource Quarterly.

As a percentage of total energy usage, the share of energy generated from biomass has, on a global basis, increased from 16% in 2006 to 18% in 2009. Norway and Sweden took the lead in biomass usage at 42% and 38%, respectively, followed by Canada, Brazil and New Zealand. At the other end of the spectrum are China, Australia, Japan, Spain and Germany, all of which are countries where the pulp mills on average used less than 10% renewable energy at their plants last year.

Another interesting development is that with the increased usage of bark and wood fibre for energy, pulp mills have expanded their external sourcing of the biomass. In 2006, 53% woody biomass was purchased in the open market; in 2009, this share had increased to 69%. Pulp and paper mills in Latin America and Asia/Oceania were generally less reliant on purchased biomass than plants in Europe and North America.

(Source: Wood Resources International LLC)

Wood Makes a Stand at Winter Olympics

When Alexandre Bilodeau stepped on the podium to receive his medal in Freestyle Skiing Men’s Moguls last week, it marked the first time a Canadian has won gold on home soil in the Winter Olympic Games. Also of cultural significance, Bilodeau received his gold medal standing on a podium made from wood indigenous to British Columbia. The 23 podiums used in the Vancouver 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Games were constructed from 18 wood types. According to a release by the Ministry of Forests and Range, “The podiums provide insight to British Columbia’s culture and geography, including the 10,000-year history of First Nations, forests managed by local communities and the importance of forestry to the Province’s economy.”

The wood podiums, along with 84 medal trays, were built by team at the University of British Columbia’s Centre for Advanced Wood Processing (CAWP). Led by wood manufacturing specialist Vincent Leung, the team included technical staff and current and past students of the UBC’s B.Sc. Wood Products Processing program. In constructing the unique podiums, the raw lumber was first sent to a Vancouver millwork company, where it was dried and fabricated into edge-glued panels. The panels were then sent to the manufacturing area at CAWP where, utilizing Mastercam CAD software and SCM CNC machining centres, the team cut more than 250 unique parts required for each of the podiums. The jigsaw puzzle-like parts were then provided to the RONA 2010 Fabrication Shop in East Vancouver for assembly.

In a second Olympic project, UBC Wood Products Processing students and industrial design students from Emily Carr University worked together on a unique class project in which they designed and built outdoor furniture that will be used in the Athlete’s Villages in Vancouver and Whistler, as well as at several Olympic Games venues.

(Source:Woodworking Network and www.vancouver2010.com)

Buy and Sell

...and finally...Catholic ingenuity...

Sister Mary Ann, a nun who worked for a home health agency, was out making her rounds visiting homebound patients when she ran out of petrol. As luck would have it, a Shell Petrol station was just a block away.

She walked to the station to borrow a can and buy some petrol. The attendant told her that the only can he owned had been loaned out, but she could wait until it was returned. Since Sister Mary Ann was on the way to see a patient, she decided not to wait and walked back to her car.

She looked for something in her car that she could fill with petrol and spotted the bedpan she was taking to the patient. Always resourceful, Sister Mary Ann carried the bedpan to the station, filled it with petrol, and carried the full bedpan back to her car.

As she was pouring the petrol into her tank, two Baptists watched from across the street. One of them turned to the other and said,

'If it starts, I'm turning Catholic.'

And on that note, enjoy the rest of your week. Cheers.

John Stulen
Innovatek Ltd Rotorua Office
PO Box 6160
Rotorua 3043
New Zealand

Ph:+64 7 921 1382
Fax:+64 7 348 1420
Web page: www.innovatek.co.nz

This week's extended issue can be viewed at www.woodweek.com