At the end of last week, representatives of the Romanian Association of the Wood Industry – Prolemn and of the Romanian Furniture Manufacturers Association (APMR) met with the new management team of RNP – Romsilva to work out together the best solutions for overcoming the raw material crisis in the market.
In the context of insufficient resource available on the Romanian wood market and the prices have exploded for the industrial operators as well as household consumers, the National Directorate of Forests – Romsilva, which manages 48% of the country’s forests, set harvest quotas for 2022 under the possibility of harvesting given by the forest arrangements.
The Prolemn-APMR delegation requested the observance of the Forestry Code and of the regulations in the field
At the meeting with Mr. George Mierliță, general manager of RNP-Romsilva, the representatives of the wood industry supported the need for additional efforts on behalf of RNP to achieve the targets set by the Forestry Code and the Regulation for timber harvesting, that is, harvesting timber at levels determined by the forest management plans (FMPs).
According to official data, the total possibility for publicly owned forests managed by RNP, by summing up the harvesting possibilities established for all the forest management plans, is 11 million m3. If we consider the reserves accumulated on the FMPs in force, the total possibility increases to 13 million m3.
Mr. George Mierliță pointed out that this year the Board of Directors of Romsilva established a quota similar to that of previous years – 9.5 million m3. The difference between this quota and the possibility established by forest management is given by those forest areas for which forest services are suspended, areas being returned, being redeveloped or for which the appropriate environmental assessment must be completed.
At the same time, the management of Romsilva showed that there is an additional resource of 1.5 million m3 left unharvested from the previous year, which was contracted and is in operation.
The crisis in the timber market is extremely serious, blockages must be removed
Cătălin Tobescu, the president of AIL – Prolemn, and Aurica Sereny, the president of APMR, underlined the gravity of the crisis that the Romanian producers are facing and insisted on unblocking the situation as soon as possible.
According to publicly available information, the volume of standing timber harvest established by the Board of Directors of RNP – Romsilva is 55% of the annual harvest quota, while art. 14 para. 2 of the Government Ordinance 715/2017 stipulates a percentage between 60% and 80%. The volume that should have been put out to tender was at least 3.135 million m3, the actual volume offered being 2.55 million m3.
Last year, Romanian furniture manufacturers complained about the biggest wood crisis in recent history. We received constant complaints from the association, the members were announcing that very little wood was being put up for auction, which led to an exaggerated increase in the price of wood. We insist that this year the auctions for the shaped wood from the public forests of the state should be organized as soon as possible, so that there will be wood in the market, and the companies will be able to carry out their production activity, under normal conditions.
The transition to shaped wood was another important point of discussion. Romsilva management aims to provide 45% of the wood in shaped form this year, and industry representatives have asked Regia to sort the wood according to the needs of the industry and that the sale should be made mainly from warehouses, in order to avoid unfair competition or illegally logged timber. Of the total timber placed on the market as shaped wood in 2021, 75% was offered on forest roads and only 25% in warehouses.
Invitation to continue the constructive dialogue
As founding members of the Council of Forests, Wood Industry and Green Economy, the representatives of AIL – Prolemn and APMR offered the management of RNP – Romsilva an official invitation to continue the dialogue with the wood industry organizations, via formal participation in the platform.
The participation of RNP – Romsilva in the Council of Forests is seen as an important condition for harmonizing the views of industry and public policies, as well as for improved transparency and dialogue for sustainable forest management and the sustainable development of a vital sector of the economy.