Grown in Britain will Bring Commitment to ‘Buy British Wood Products’

The majority of Duchy Timber's garden furniture is made from British Timber grown within 100miles of our sawmill in Mid-Cornwall.

Last week the Chief Executive of the Confederation of Forest Industries (Confor) launched an exciting new programme to strengthen the supply chain and promote the use of British timber more widely.

The need for the Grown in Britain programme was identified in last year’s Independent Panel on Forestry and their Final Report in July 2012. It said:

“Recommendation 18: We urge Government, woodland owners and businesses to seize the opportunity provided by woodlands to grow our green economy by strengthening the supply chain, and promoting the use of wood more widely across our society and economy. These and other actions should be set out in a Wood Industry Action Plan.”

Supported by Defra, The Forestry Commission, Confor, the Building Research Establishment (BRE), the Institute of Chartered Foresters (ICF), along with several major civil engineering firms and retailers, the programme gathered 50 of the supporting organisations together last Friday in London.

Confor Chief Executive Stuart Goodall said:

“We wanted to get these industry customers to express their commitment to Grown in Britain and buying British wood products, so the business in the supply chain can take that on board and start to consider what they can do to bring more products to the market,”

At Duchy Timber, we have made a conscious effort to source the best timber from within the Southwest region. We have cultivated excellent working relationships with harvesting contractors and landowners alike to ensure that our first-rate supply is maintained and that these partners in the supply chain are assured of our capacity and our on-going development.

A Grown in Britain week will be held on October 14th – 20th, with timber industry supply chain companies encouraged to open their doors to their communities to educate and enthuse them about the benefits and environmental credentials of wood products. This forms part of a key focus of Grown in Britain - creating a wood and forestry culture amongst the British general public. At Duchy Timber we plan to participate in the Grown in Britain week by having an open day on Saturday 19th October. Further details will follow in the next few months.

Part of the programme’s on-going support for the industry will see Stuart Goodall chair a ‘supply side’ panel consisting of timber processors, woodland owners and managers, forestry trade associations and partnerships in a position to change how woodland management is perceived by land owners, consumers and other parts of society. This group will ‘translate’ the requirements of the demand side panel into action in our forests and woodlands.

I’m sure that the rest of the industry shares Duchy Timber’s enthusiasm for this new programme. We will keep a close eye on future developments and hope that the programme makes some great progress in the coming months.

Home-grown sawn timber sector bucks recessionary trend

Despite rain and recession, Duchy Timber Limited has seen a really great start to 2013. It’s great to hear that we’re not the only ones!

A log delivery at the Duchy Timber sawmill in Lostwithiel, Cornwall.

The following article comes courtesy of the Timber Trades Journal (TTJ): http://www.ttjonline.com/“The UK softwood sawmilling market is one of few industry sectors to register solid growth in the last few years.” This is according to the Confederation of Forest Industries (Confor). The comment was made by Confor chairman George Webb at the organisation's industry dinner, attended by people including Paul Wheelhouse MSP, Scotland's Minister for Environment and Climate Change.

“Against a background of the current economic climate and outlook, to be increasing wood production and wood conversion, to see continued significant capital investment and see increased exports of value added products, from our sector is very promising,” he said.

Mr Webb told the audience that the UK’s home-grown sawn softwood sector had seen its market share of the overall UK sawn timber sector increase from 20% to 40% during the last five years. But he admitted there remained a “massive challenge” as to how the industry would maintain and increase its output from the resources available.“The lack of commercial conifer planting over the last two decades is very apparent and will reflect significantly on future wood availability.” He said Confor was working on an action plan to tackle this challenge.