Prices of Gabon hardwood logs and sawnwood have largely been unchanged from last month with demand assessed as ‘moderate’.
Demand comes largely from China, for belli, tali and other heavy species.
Producers report very strong demand for good quality okoume peeler logs and slightly better demand for okoume sawnwood. Okoume log prices are very firm at EUR250 – 255 cbm.
However robust demand from international markets has also created a shortage of good peeler logs at the mills in the Gabon Special Economic Zone (SEZ) and a build-up of stocks of lower quality non-peeler logs.
The capacity of the mills in the SEZ is said to be more than sufficient to process all the available peeler quality logs.
Some mills have proposed importing okume logs from the Republic of Congo but freight and other charges would make this uneconomic.
Source: ITTO
