'We’re not having much pain at the moment, a lot of our wood is being directed to Kiwi lumber rather than export. I’ve noticed in the trucking yards a lot more trucks parked up so there mustn’t be as much wood going. We haven’t had quotas put on us yet but have heard of other crews parked up at the moment.
Speaking with a few financiers at the moment and there’s a lot of crews going interest only over this period. UDC and Speirs are really good to deal with, the main banks are less so. BNZ asset finance are more removed from forestry than they have been in the past and asking customers to extend their trading limits rather than seek interest only period.
We log for farming woodlots and so far all the farmers who are currently logging are happy to continue but we have been warned that it might be an early stop at Xmas depending where the prices go and if there’s enough blocks still available for kiwi rather than export, or we might go to 80% production.
We’ve also been trialling this past month on doing our own roadworks to help with timing delays associated with roading issues. Might look to make this part of the business going forward if it pays off.'
- Juliette
This regional update from our Board Members was written November 2021 during the Covid pandemic and log price downturn. It featured in the December 2021 Christmas Update from Women in Forestry.
