Buyers of Finnish wood-processing companies have made exceptionally large individual purchases of raw material this year. Wealthy owners of forest have felled thousands of cubic metres of wood, whereas normally the average individual sale involves just 500 cubic metres.
Forest owners and buyers of wood expect an "even and positive" autumn. All types of wood are selling well, although buyers are not actually raising prices in spite of heavy demand and the budding economic upturn.
The boom in selling is the result of planned changes in the taxation of forest income which come into effect at the beginning of 2006. At that time all sales of timber will be subject to a 29% tax on the real price that is paid.
Many forest owners continue to be taxed on the basis of the estimated yield of their land. This provides an incentive to sell as much wood as possible before the new taxation system comes into effect.
Most forest owners have already switched to taxation of sales, but owners of large tracts of forest land have stuck with hectare-based taxation. If they are to avert double taxation - that of both surface area and sales - they need to complete their sales by December next year. Matti Karjula of the paper manufacturer Stora Enso says that the company’s buyers have made exceptionally large purchases of wood recently.
Forest owners had feared that the rush of sales would lead to a decline in wood prices.
However, most of the surge in sales has been for pine and spruce logs, whose prices have remained largely unchanged. On the other hand, the price of pulpwood used by the pulp and paper industry has gone down - a reflection of the current low market prices of the finished product.
