B.C.’s lumber exporters achieved a new record on China-bound exports, as more than four billion board feet of lumber were shipped as of the end of November 2011, according to Ministry of Jobs, Tourism and Innovation information released this morning.
Last year’s export sales to China, with December still to report, hit 4.28 billion board feet– a 74% increase over 2010.
“B.C. forest companies, communities and workers have all benefited enormously from the creation of a market for B.C. lumber products in China,” Canfor (TSX: CFP) CEO Don Kayne said in the ministry press release.
“B.C.’s presence in China has been an astonishingly successful strategy that permanently changed the market mix and economics of B.C.’s forest sector.”
Sales to China, now valued at more than $1 billion, make up 29% of all B.C. lumber exports. Only the U.S., at 42% of exports, is a larger market.
According to the ministry, Jobs Minister Pat Bell set a goal in 2008 to export four billion board feet of lumber to China in 2011.
“Our results are simply astounding and now some two dozen sawmills across B.C. have reopened or added shifts in part due to lumber exports to China, creating thousands of jobs in communities from Vavenby to Fort St. John to Nanaimo,” Bell said in the release.
Jenny Wagler
@JennyWagler_BIV