Year 2010

1st Congress of the Sawmill Industry, 28 October 2010.

Around 2,300-2,500 registrated sawmills are situated in countries of Southeast Europe which process more than 70% broad-leaved trees like beech, oak and ash, and some fir trees and pine trees. According to estimations, the installed sawmill capacities are around 6 million m3, as there are no exact statistics and no precise numbers. Most of them are organised in small sawmills with only some automatization, but all the countries of the region have many medium sized wood processors with a cutting capacity of 60-100,000 m3. There are no modern type sawmills in the region. The sawmill production in Southeast Europe is similar and connected in many ways, but neither comprehensive statistics of the achieved results have been produced so far, nor systematic monitoring of the market trends.The technological level of processing, the number of engaged labour force, and the cutting performance per employee are not even near the levelas in countries with developed sawmill industry. The conclusion is that sawmill processing of wood in Southeast Europe opens new opportunities and represents a challenge for many improvements and upgradings.

Goals of 1st Congress

• analysis of market opportunities for sawmills in the countries of Southeast Europe and the Region
• introduction of the European and world trends in commercial aspects of primary wood processing
• overview of the technical and technological aspects of the machinery used in the sawmill industry
• exchange of experience and making contacts with colleagues from West & Southeast Europe i.e. Region
• strengthening of relations with representatives from the forestry and institutions in order to create a good business environment

Programe from 1st Congress

• Quality of logs in regional sawmills
• Analysis of the log prices ex sawmill in countries of the region
• Statistics on the logs exploitation(small, medium and big sawmills)
• Implementation of standards and EU norms for logs and saw wood
• Trends in the EU sawmill industry
• Problem related to shrapnel in the sawmill industry
• New technologies in optimizing process
• Use of lasers in the sawmill industry
• New drying technologies
• Silos, pipelines and exhaustion systems
• Poplar sawing in the Danube area
• Branding of some tree species –example of Slavonic oak
• Investments in modern sawing technologies (examples from the USA, Russia, Scandinavia, Africa)
• Sales of saw wood and elements/analysis of some EU markets
• Exploitation of scraps and issue of the wood biomass –production of pellets
• Energy from wood –examples with different boilers
• *October 29th –optional visit to local sawmills andforests in Slavonia.

DOWNLOAD DOCUMENTS

• 1st Congress Programme, 2010.
• Press release, 25.10.2010.

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