International Wood Fair Klagenfurt has closed its 51st anniversary edition on last Sunday with record visit of 22.000 visitors. 452 companies participated from 22 countries and 1/3 of visitors came from abroad.
 

Demand for methanol has held relatively steady over the past few weeks, as well. Manufacturers said that the second quarter had proved to be better than the first three months of the year. Insiders anticipated that business would at least hold steady at this level in the third quarter. On the other hand, the supply side of the market is characterized by curtailments related to a number of scheduled and unscheduled production stoppages. This situation will persist in the fourth quarter, as well.
 

The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has awarded $69,975 to a company based in Albany, Oregon, which has developed a plywood adhesive made from soybean flour.  Lao K LLC was among 34 small businesses to share $2.38m awarded by the EPA’s National Center for Environmental Research to help small businesses develop innovative and sustainable technologies. Lao K’s award will be put towards research to determine if the adhesive, and a curing agent used in the process, can be made and used on a commercial basis. It says the new resin, developed in a laboratory, would provide a non-toxic, environmentally-friendly alternative to “carcinogenic” urea formaldehyde resin.
 

The Austrian sawmilling industry exported a total of 1.37m m3 (Jan. – March 2009: 1.29m m3) of softwood lumber in the first quarter of 2010. This represents growth of around 6% against the same quarter of last year. Particularly striking here was the 44% growth in exports to Germany to 126,130 m3 (87,689 m3). Italy, the main buyer, took delivery of roughly 5% more at 820,023 m3 (778,834 m3).
 

Within the next few days German Pellets will be starting up production of pellets in the new plant of NRW Pellets GmbH in the intercommunity industrial estate of Siegen-Wittgenstein. The plant has been designed for a production capacity of around 120,000t per annum, with production focusing particularly on DINplus pellets and A1 pellets. Roundwood as well as sawdust are to be used primarily as raw materials in the pellet plant. Therefore, from the beginning onwards, the plant has been equipped with a roundwood preparation system as well as bark-stripping plants, a chipping system as well as hackers and hammer mills.
 

Workers at two Plysorol subsidiaries in Gabon held managers hostage to enforce pay demands. The managers were released after several hours in the premises of Leroy Gabon and Pogab in Libreville when they agreed to pay the workers in line with a collective bargaining agreement. The French plywood company, bought by two Chinese companies last year, was recently placed in receivership by a French court. French conservationists have expressed concern at the takeover of the company by Chinese businessman Guohua Zhang, who also owns Honest Timber. Plysorol owns 500,000ha of forest in Gabon.
 

Selling prices for softwood sawlog assortments on the Swedish log market continued to rise during the course of June after the first marked price increases of SEK90-140/m³ had already been pushed through by forest owners in May. The additional mark-ups of around SEK30-50/m³ are said to be attributable to unabated high demand and still rather below-average supply in some regions.
 

The mood in the Central and North European multi-layer parquet industry continued to show a depressed trend towards the middle of the year. Although various companies reported that they had achieved budgeted figures for the first six months, targets in most cases tended to have been set at a low level and were often only reached after very strenuous efforts. Overall, the business situation in the field of multi-layer parquet must still therefore be described as tight.
 

At the 51st international exhibition of wood Klagenfurt, which will be held this year from 26 to 29 of August, is expected to more than 420 exhibitors from 20 countries, including exhibitors and visitors from Bosnia-Herzegovina - it is reported today in Sarajevo during the presentation of this fair.
 

Karntner Messen Klagenfurt organize presentation and press conference of International Messe Klagenfurt" (www.kaerntnermessen.at), the most important Fair of Central Europe. Presentation will be held at UNITIC business centre (conference room nr.7) on the 17th June 2010 and it will start at 11:00h.