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TIMBER INDUSTRY HAS HIT HARD TIMES |
| (04/07/2008) |
| The globalization of US jobs, the housing bust and skyrocketing energy costs are causing a whole string of problems for mom-and-pop loggers and sawmills in the nation's hardwood lumber industry. Tens of thousands of jobs in the US furniture industry have been shifted abroad, with a growing number of raw logs being shipped overseas for processing. Change in consumer tastes and construction downturns have decreased the demand for hardwood flooring and trim. The lights have been turned off in states like North Carolina, long known for their furniture making. The result has been rising unemployment for forestry workers, with the market continuing to bottom out. U.S. Forest Service economist Bill Luppold says production will dip further, to less than 10.5 billion board feet this year. "I don't even think the numbers demonstrate how bad it is," Luppold said. "We haven't seen this amount of decline year in and year out since the early part of the (20th) century." The industry's problems started a decade ago with the globalizing of U.S. furniture making, with companies not wanting to pay $8-$10 an hour wages. Manufacturing has shifted to China, Vietnam and a half-dozen other countries, cheaper labor, lower operating costs and few environmental restrictions. Tony Woodyard of Twin River Hardwoods of Mason County says he has to keep running his mills to pay the debt he took on to buy them. "The prices are where they were 20 years ago," says Woodyard, who has more than two decades in the business. Another problem is a shift in consumer tastes. Homeowners once wanted red oak, the most common hardwood in Appalachia, and now they want lighter-grained species, especially maple and poplar. The market is also being flooded with raw timber from Russia and China. Overall, it seems like a pretty bleak future for timber and timber products in the US, including the "little guy" in West Virginia who managed to make a living in the woods.
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