HOME Regions Amur Region 27.03.2014

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The wood is cut - chips do not reach

Far Eastern forest is more profitable to sell "raw"

The export of Far Eastern timber has been steadily declining in recent years. However, experts predict the development of timber processing in the macroregion, for the sake of which the government raised duties on the export of "round timber".

The Far East forms one third of all Russian timber exports. According to EastRussia.ru in the forestry department of the Far Eastern Federal District, the territory of the district occupies 616,9 million hectares, of which more than 80% (496,6 million hectares) is the area of the forest fund. As of January 1, 2014, 6815 lease agreements for forest plots and agreements of permanent unlimited use, including 801 timber harvesting agreements, are in force in the district. The area of use of forest plots under lease agreements is 75,3 million hectares, which is 15% of the total area of the forest fund of the district, while 36% of the leased area is used for logging.

"In the Far East, 11 investment projects are being implemented in the area of forest development, including 5 in the Khabarovsk Territory, 3 in the Primorsky Territory, 2 in the Amur Region and 1 in the Sakhalin Region. The total declared volume of investments in projects is 47,20 billion rubles. At 1 January, 37,77 billion rubles were invested. In the budget system of the Russian Federation, enterprises implementing priority investment projects, transferred 497,37 million rubles, "- noted in the department.

With such parameters, it is not surprising that the timber industry occupies an important part in the economy of the macroregion, and, given its location, is aimed at foreign markets. However, in recent years, the share of timber harvesting has been significantly reduced. According to the Far Eastern Customs Administration, in 2013, less timber was exported to 9% than in 2012: 5,6 million cubic meters vs. 6,2 million cubic meters. As explained by EastRussia.ru, the general director of ZAO Smena Trading, chairman of the association Daleksportles Alexander Sidorenko, the reason for high duties on timber exports, which were raised in 2008. In the Far East, they are twice as high as in other regions, so the market of the Asia-Pacific region is occupied by other countries.

"In 2007, Russia exported to the APR 33 million cubic meters of round timber, and in 2013 18,8 million cubic meters. At the same time, the US exported 2007 thousand cubic meters to the ATP in 440, and 2013 million in 17 million. New Zealand at the same time increased exports to the macroregion from 6 to 19,1 million cubic meters, "A. Sidorenko noted.

High duties were to stimulate loggers not to sell raw materials abroad, but to develop timber processing. Statistics show that, for the time being, this approach does not work at full strength: the volume of export of processed wood in 2013 also decreased by 5% to 1,177 million tons in comparison with 2012 year. Sidorenko explained that the matter is in high costs for processing, which do not pay off even with duty-free export of finished products. As an example, he led the timber processing company Arkaim, which has been in a difficult situation for a long time. Recently, a criminal case was opened against the management of the enterprise on the fact of non-payment of wages to employees within two months.

A.Sydorenko is also skeptical about the investors' response to the proposal of the Amur Region to build a wood-processing technology park on its territory.

"This is a good project, it will give new jobs. But no one has the opportunity to invest in it, only state funds can do it, "he said.

Another example of inefficient investments in timber processing is the Rimbunan Hidzhau MDF plant for the production of wood fiber boards (MDF), as well as sawn timber. Malaysian investors began to build a factory in 2007 year, by the time of completion of construction in 2011, the volume of investments amounted to 3,3 billion rubles. As a result, last year the production of the slab stopped, now the enterprise retains only a small production of sawn timber and shipment of raw materials for export, so as not to stop the plant at all.

The products of deep wood processing turned out to be of low profitability, Vyacheslav Kovalev, deputy minister of natural resources of the Khabarovsk Territory, chairman of the forest industry committee of the regional government, explained to the agency.

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“Now the company is taking measures to negotiate a favorable price with customers,” he told EastRussia, adding that this is about the APR market.

According to V. Kovalev, Rimbunan Hijau plans to change the concept of the plant in order to reduce production costs. For this, the company will produce lumber from large wood, and the waste from this production will go to MDF boards. The purchase of new equipment will again require investment, so even if we succeed in achieving a high profitability project, it will pay off for a long time.

A separate problem for the forests of the Far East is illegal logging. Unauthorized wood exports often exceed limited quantities. The last high-profile case occurred in Khabarovsk, when the deputy head of the regional forestry administration was suspected of organizing a criminal community for harvesting high-quality forest under the guise of sanitary cutting. The damage from the four-year activity of the organized criminal group has yet to be calculated. The same problem is relevant for the Primorsky Territory, where a law on the circulation of wood was adopted to solve it. It came into force at the end of 2013, and controls all aspects of logging: a register of forest receiving points has been drawn up, each batch of exported timber must be declared. Due to this, according to the government of Primorye, the number of “black loggers” for January-February 2014 of the year decreased by half. True, loggers complain about the red tape with documentation, which slows down their work and also has a negative impact on entering the ATP market.

For example, Pavel Korchagin, General Director of the Primorsky Association of Timber Industrialists and Forest Exporters, believes that excessive restrictions have a negative impact on the industry, and the greatest problems are created not by external markets, but by domestic initiatives of the state.

“So far, of the projects implemented in Primorye, more or less has been implemented only in Terneiles. The rest have problems with implementation due to the lack of raw materials and unreasonable restrictions, ”he told EastRussia.ru.

We are talking about the investment project of JSC "Terneyles" for the production of sawn timber and veneer worth 4 billion rubles, the construction of the plant was completed in 2010.

P. Korchagin assumes that soon a new restriction will appear at the Far Eastern wood processing enterprises. One of the main trees of the local forests, Mongolian Oak and Manchurian Ash, fell into the CITES Convention (Secretariat of the Convention on International Trade in Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) as endangered.

“Enterprises will have to obtain additional licenses, which will increase bureaucratic red tape and waste of time. But, possibly, illegal logging will be reduced, ”P. Korchagin reflects.

At the same time, market participants themselves, according to him, are in a state of “alert anticipation.”

The leading expert of the management company Finam Management Dmitry Baranov is sure that the concept of developing deep processing of the forest instead of exporting the round timber is promising.

“Yes, there are certain throwings from our officials, but nevertheless loggers can hardly count on returning to the large-scale export of roundwood from the country. And no one will reduce the duties, the authorities have repeatedly stated this. It is clear that this path is not long and it will not be possible to go quickly, but a lot has already been done, ”said an expert at EastRussia.ru.

Therefore, in his opinion, the project of a timber processing technopark in the Amur Region should be implemented as quickly as possible and provide him with all-round support. D. Baranov acknowledges that while domestic production from wood is not quite competitive, as it is produced recently and it is not very well known in the market.

“It is more profitable for foreigners to buy round timber from us, make products from it and sell them at exorbitant prices to us, and they absolutely do not want to see Russian products at home,” the expert added.

Nevertheless, he is confident that gradually the share of exports of quality products will increase.

Text: Anton Ivanov