Timber has risen 20% in price this year here in Yorkshire and prices are set to continue to rise.

Personally I hate those Larch Lap fencing panels, but some of my customers want them, but there is a national shortage of them! I thought it might be due to the storms earlier this year but I am told it is because China is buying up much of the Worlds timber due to the rapid development of that country, and this is forcing the prices up. One big fencing panel manufacturer near me has had to lay off most of his men due to not being able to secure timber supplies!

This is a worrying development, I hope some serious thought will be given to producing more and better home grown timber! It might be already too late for the next generation of Carpenters.

At the beginning of 2007 the UK had almost 1.700.000 ha of FSC certified forests.
http://woodyoulike.typepad.com/tips/2007/03/forest_stewarts.html
More incentives are needed IMHO

This sounds like the same thing that is happening in all commodity markets, whether it be food, energy, minerals or now timber. Rapid demand growth from the BRIC economies combined with static supplies.

It takes along time to increase production of timber, in a sustainable way in any case, same as it takes along time to dig a new mine or put a new oil field into production. The result is higher prices.

Could the introdcution of FSC certification be having any effect? Presumable this places an annual limit on what timber can be cut from a forest?

Re effect of FSC certification. Yes, you're right, but on the other hand in a FSC forest or plantation there's always a 'supply' of wood - one year from this block, the other year from another etc - where the 'emptied' block has to be re-forest again, turning a forest in a sustainable ongoing 'production' unit.

biffvernon is right too.

Posted By: funcrusher

Bloody good post!

I don't think it's quite that simple. Britain is still, contrary to rumours, one of the biggest manufacturing nations in the world. And the growth of financial services has allowed us to become rediculously rich without even getting dirt behind our finger nails. Of course it'll all end in tears. Did you see the Rees-Mogg article in the Times yesterday:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/william_rees_mogg/article2080497.ece

There is much in what you say Chris. In fact GNP is not and was never intended to be some meaure of standard of living. It was devised hurriedly by expert economists for the US government c 1942 so it could measure productive capacity and control the war effort as efficiently as possible. Subsequently it was hi-jacked by politicians, particularly the left-leaning, who saw merit in a government-direction of the economy. An obvious drawback to the concept is that it gives little or no weight to DIY/self sufficiency. If you and I dig our own gardens, that is unrecorded. If we dig each other's for payment, that's economic growth. This leads to one of the great delusions, because most growth in GNP has stemmed from re-deployment of women outside the home. That causes a massive surge in GNP as their previous work as a housewife was ignored but all the replacement purchase of child-minding, caring for the elderly, prepared food etc etc is counted as GNP. In fact I have a suspicion that if we could measure and include all the externalites (eg extra congestion, carbon footprints, children's quality of life, etc) we would find civilisation is worse off.

Meanwhile:

A Sheffield man once made shovels, many of which were exported. He was increasingly weighed down with regulations and found he could make a much better living as a hairdresser. This enhanced GDP and the Chancellor was pleased at the resulting economic growth.

He enjoyed entertaining customers whilst he cut their hair and soon decided that he should restructure his business by closing his shop and focussing on entertaining passers-by by doing jigs and stunts on the pavement. The public rewarded him well by showering him with money for doing very little and the chancellor rejoiced at the surge in productivity and economic output.

However, he soon realised that entertaining the public was unnecessary, as they seemed willing to part with large sums of money easily enough. So he set up as a fund manager and earned a fortune doing absolutely nothing. The chancellor was triumphant at this unprecedented prosperity in the new knowledge-based economy.

Shame Zimbabwe hasn't got an oil industry. The Yanks would have bombed the blighter into the Stone Age by now. If there is one man on the planet (there might be others...) who definitely deserves a cruise missile down his chimney its him.

I agree with funcrusher's point about work in the home. This policy of trying to get both parents into the workforce before the babies are even a year old stinks. You're right, it all about getting the GDP numbers up. Nurseries create growth, stay at home parents don't.

A rare insight from the chap who runs our local gym a while back. He blames the housing boom on letting a second wage onto the mortgage application. All it has done is fuel price increases so that now both parents have no choice but to work in order to afford a house.

We haven't got it as bad as the Chinese though. They're grafting dawn till dusk for 20p an hour and all the fruits of their labour are being sent to the West in exchange for bits of paper which they can't spend because we don't make anything to sell them. They won't put up with that for much longer I shouldn't think.

Heard about these "Sovereign Wealth Funds"? They (the Chinese and the Arabs) are gearing up to buy up everything in sight; property, commodities, companies. Assets markets are already rising out of control, this will just add fuel to flames.

Posted By: biffvernon< We must be very rich to be able to have so many houses for our population, proportionately almost three times as many as a century ago.

Not for much longer methinks

Posted By: richyTimber has risen 20% in price this year here in Yorkshire and prices are set to continue to rise.

Interesting. Here in Montreal it is quite a bit cheaper this year. In the local hardware store, a 2x4x10' is Can$2.98 - last year it was Can$3.47. Maybe it's because of the collapse of the US housing market (a lot of wood is exported from Canada to the US - so much so that the US imposed all sorts of illegal tariffs for a while).

As for the finance markets etc. it's always worth remembering that money has no intrinsic value - it is just the collective delusion that makes it appear it has an actual value. I'm sure many people in Argentina are painfully aware of this.

Paul in Montreal

So we have effectively become butlers and maids to the rich and famous then Tom. Personally, I think I'd rather live in penury. I think your comparison to the "back passage" is quite apt but I would be more specific and compare them to the thing at the end of it...

They certainly spend a lot of money, but they save a much greater proportion of their income that the less well off. When you give a hedge fund manager a £10 million bonus he will likely buy a property in London for say £2m, putting up prices for the rest of us, splurge a few hundred grand on luxury goods, which are probably mostly imported, pay about £1m in tax and salt the other £6.5m in an offshore trust. Not a sound basis for an economy in my opinion.

Off course, he won't be getting a bonus next year because his hedge fund he runs will most likely have gone belly up and a good thing too since his business is dependent on the continued expansion of an unsustainble credit bubble. The sooner this bursts and sanity can return to the financial markets the better. We could then focus our attention on addressing some important problems like Peak Oil.

I do wonder what is going to happen to the housing market in the South East and the UK economy in general if the turmoil in the credit markets worsens, as I think it will. The financial services industry has produced about 40% of our economic growth in recent years. Throw that into reverse and I would not be surprised if we head into a recession next year led by a down turn in house prices, particularly as public spending is tightening. What's left to keep things going?

I agree with Paul's comment re the intrinsic value of paper money. Take a note out of your wallet and ask yourself "why is this worth anything?". Just because other people believe it is? Why do they believe this when the central banks allow the banking system to create more of it out of thin air? When there is no scarcity there is no value. Real wealth is land and energy resources. Real money is gold and silver bullion.

Perhaps the underlying reason for the increase in timber prices is the amount of money printing by central bankers...

We have our usual glut of timber here in NZ, logs siting by the wharf waiting patiently for a spare ship to grace us with it's presents!
Ships are in short supply & shipping companies make more money transporting high quailty products in and out of China.

cargo cult?

Hi Jeff, Tell me more about NZ Timber ie, costs, do you know if any ends up in the uk.

Interesting to hear Paul say that the Canadians also have 'illegal' tarrifs imposed upon them by the US. I wonder if they let in US nuclear powered warships

Thaks Jeff, I thought you would be tucked up in bed by now.

Interesting that most of the countries on the stats data are pacific rim, or close. Not surprising though.

I wonder if it is the additional cost of getting through either of the canals or other factors that prevent it coming into the EU such as Tarriffs. I suspect a little bit of both.

Interesting to hear you mention the lack of ships to export. A polish coleague of mentioned that they have a similar problem with trucks. ie lots of trucks coming back empty therefore having to charge the exporter for a round trip.

I suppose inported DVD players don't take up as much room as timber.

I'd love to lay my hands on a freighter full of Rimu know where I'd get some.