![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Sep. 14th, 2003 11:11 amAn article here discussed the difficulty that people in the potential path of Isabel will have getting plywood. The article, in part, says:
A rainy year in the South has cut into southern pine harvests, making it hard for timber companies to get trees out of the forests, so supply was already short before the summer housing boom. Add the fires out west and some mills had to cut back production considerably.
Lumber supply was already tightening in late spring because of the weather. And because the economy hadn't picked up, retailers cut inventory. Then mortgage rates went to 40-year lows in June and July, creating a record number of housing starts in July. That's when prices really shot up.
...
The shortage and high prices are being felt nationwide, not just in the Southeast.
"Everybody is begging" for plywood, Ed McDermid, president of Frontier Lumber in Buffalo, New York, told The Buffalo News earlier this month. "You basically have to have a friend to get it."
Many suppliers are blaming military purchases for taking so much plywood out of the market.
But industry experts say the purchase by the Defense Logistics Agency of $50 million worth is a tiny fraction of the amount bought in the multibillion industry each year.
Is it just me, or is it just maybe possible that this is having at least some effect on the shortage?
A rainy year in the South has cut into southern pine harvests, making it hard for timber companies to get trees out of the forests, so supply was already short before the summer housing boom. Add the fires out west and some mills had to cut back production considerably.
Lumber supply was already tightening in late spring because of the weather. And because the economy hadn't picked up, retailers cut inventory. Then mortgage rates went to 40-year lows in June and July, creating a record number of housing starts in July. That's when prices really shot up.
...
The shortage and high prices are being felt nationwide, not just in the Southeast.
"Everybody is begging" for plywood, Ed McDermid, president of Frontier Lumber in Buffalo, New York, told The Buffalo News earlier this month. "You basically have to have a friend to get it."
Many suppliers are blaming military purchases for taking so much plywood out of the market.
But industry experts say the purchase by the Defense Logistics Agency of $50 million worth is a tiny fraction of the amount bought in the multibillion industry each year.
Is it just me, or is it just maybe possible that this is having at least some effect on the shortage?
