On Wednesday, 4 September 2024, as part of the business programme of the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, a session entitled ‘Forest Complex: Technologies of Modern Wooden Housebuilding’ was held. Speaking at the meeting, Nikolay Ivanov, Member of the Management Board, Vice President for External Affairs, Head of Board Materials and Housebuilding Division of Segezha Group, announced the company's readiness to implement projects in the Arctic and Far East. In addition, the expert said that the holding plans to focus on the production of high-margin wooden housebuilding products and the necessary measures for full utilisation of production.

According to Nikolay Ivanov, in the conditions of reduced geography of sawn timber and plywood exports, it is important to bet on the creation of high-margin products and development of wooden house-building, investments in this sphere are more expedient and effective than in projects related to timber chemistry.

‘In recent years, new pulp and paper mills have been built in South America and China, so it can be assumed that on the horizon of the next five to seven years, an additional 2-3 million tonnes of pulpwood is unlikely to find active demand. In Russia, softwood logging has fallen by 16 million cubic metres per year in three years, and the production and export of 5 million cubic metres of sawn timber has been lost due to the inaccessibility of a number of traditional markets. Wooden house building is a good option in this regard. Today sawn timber is sold with minimal profitability, so it is advisable to convert the volume of its production from cubic metres to square metres through the creation of house kits of high factory readiness,’ Nikolay Ivanov explained.

The underutilised volume of sawmilling in the Russian timber industry, which may be in demand in house building, is equivalent to 10-15 million m² of buildings of various types, depending on the construction technology. Today there are not so many producers of glued structures in Russia, and the total volume of production does not exceed 300 thousand m³. Nikolay Ivanov believes that it is necessary to produce an order of magnitude more, and it is reasonable to load those capacities that exist today with a stable order. Moreover, there is a need for the construction of modern fast-built and environmentally friendly housing. For example, in the Arctic and the Far East.

The participants of the session also discussed the expediency of the use of wooden house-building technologies in the implementation of the federal programme of resettlement from dilapidated or emergency housing. Oleg Bocharov, Deputy Head of the Ministry of Industry and Trade, reminded of the need to maintain the competitiveness of wooden housebuilding in terms of the total cost of ownership, especially when it comes to industrial house sets.

Pavel Bilibin, Vice President of the Union of Timber Producers and Timber Exporters of Russia, assessed the development potential of the wooden house building market as very high. According to him, by 2030 this segment may grow from 4.3 million m³ to 7.2 million m³. The growth in housing and communal housing may amount to about 2.5 million m³. The growth potential may be provided by the use of modular wooden structures.

Source: whatwood.ru