Friday afternoon David Venables could relax after what was generally considered as a successful American Hardwood Export Council (AHEC) 2007 conference (27-28 October in Amsterdam). The new format was generally well received by Europeans. One European importer said about the new dialog at the convention: "We feel that the Americans are taking us seriously."
This importance of the European market for US exporters was plainly visible during the presentations and discussions held during the conference. As Mike Snow, the AHEC President, pointed out, the EU remains the main market for US lumber exports worldwide. At the same time the export market has become of greater importance for US producers as domestic demand slides down. The Kitchen Cabinet Manufacturers Associations (KCMA) released recently its stats of sales in the Cabinet industry for the period of January to August - sales were down 12.8% in comparison to the same period of 2006. Red oak is being replaced in kitchen furniture by cherry, hard and soft maple. The US furniture industry sales were down 7.9% for the same period. The parquet industry remains under strong pressure from imports.
A large part of the presentation of David Venables was dedicated to the efforts made in Europe by AHEC to promote red oak. Sales in this species increased 99.6% to 12,400 m3 in the 1st semester 2007 yoy. A large part of this increase was due to strong demand from Southern Europe and in particular Italy which imported 4,800 m3. A few participants made parallels to strong demand from Italians a few years ago for Poplar/tulipwood. The Italian industry seems to have adapted to lower prices in red oak and uses its ability to taint wood. Carla Santos of Portugal confirmed that this was the reason exports to Portugal had increased.
US exporters were not able to benefit from a weaker USD and exports to the EU diminished by 2.4% to 362,650 m3 (-5.5% to 240,24 million USD). Lower demand from Spain for US white oak was one of the reasons for these lower exports. Apart from red oak, tulipwood and red alder were able to grow in volumes exported. White oak, cherry and ash diminished.
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