An originally well-intentioned federal ordinance hits private forest owners in the Weilheim-Schongau district hard.
At least there is now a small ray of hope.
District - "For us, the ordinance means that the felling has stopped," said Klaus Deibel, Managing Director of the Forest Owners Association (WBV) Weilheim, before Bavaria's Forestry and Agriculture Minister Michaela Kaniber recently negotiated a minimum limit in Berlin.
According to federal ordinance, forest owners have only been allowed to harvest 85 percent of the regular amount of fresh spruce wood across Germany since April 23.
The aim is to avert “further significant disruptions” in the raw wood market, according to the Office for Agriculture and Forests in Weilheim.
"The regulation comes two years too late," explains the Weilheim WBV boss Klaus Deibel.
At that time, according to his statements, the wood prices had "plummeted".
At times there was only 25 euros for a solid cubic meter of wood.
The effort and benefit of the felling were no longer in proportion, the forest farmers sometimes paid extra.
Thanks to the great demand from the USA and China, but also from the domestic market, the price of wood has recently increased rapidly. Deibel reports that up to 95 euros have been paid for the cubic meter. The majority of the 1,100 forest owners in the Altlandkreis Weilheim, who share 9,000 hectares, don't have much of it now.
According to the ordinance, since April 23, forest farmers are only allowed to fell 85 percent of their average for the years 2013 to 2017.
The wood that you have already felled since October 1, 2020 is included.
The only exceptions from the ordinance are wood damaged by the bark beetle and storm litter.
However, because many of the smaller forest owners do not continuously harvest wood every year and have only carried out maintenance measures at times, the amount that they are still allowed to harvest is negligible.
According to Deibel, there are only 4.25 solid cubic meters per hectare.
That corresponds to "two to three trees" and is not worthwhile despite the impressive price of wood.
Agriculture Minister provides bright spot
"For a ray of hope," said Deibel, at least Bavaria's Agriculture Minister Michaela Kaniber has now provided. She negotiated with the federal government that small forest owners may harvest 75 solid cubic meters of fresh spruce, regardless of the logging limit. According to Deibel, that's two truckloads full. The forest farmers could at least cut down their trunks threatened by bark beetles or storm throws. However, anyone who has already reached the limit of 75 solid meters since October is looking into the tube. The WBV boss from Weilheim regrets that you cannot even beat your own needs, for example for a roof structure.
In the Altlandkreis Schongau, too, the forest owners are anything but enthusiastic about the limitation of felling, says Jürgen von der Goltz.
He is one of the three foresters of the Forest Owners Association (WBV) Schongau, which has 1230 members.
6,500 hectares of forest are cultivated.
The forester knows that there is not enough round wood on the market.
That is why the WBV Schongau also welcomes the de minimis limit of 75 solid meters negotiated by the Bavarian Agriculture Minister.
After all, it is a matter of supplying the local sawmills, von der Goltz makes clear.
He also refers to the current high prices: "Of course, many want to use them, things are going fantastic at the moment," he says.
The federal impact limit will run until September 30th of this year.
“Then everyone will make wood,” the Schongau WBV forester is certain.
And in his opinion, prices should then fall again.
Above all, "if the Americans and Canadians come to an agreement," says von der Goltz, referring to the shortage of wood in the USA.
As reported, the Americans and the Chinese have been buying their wood in Germany at high prices from large sawmills for months.
The local carpenters therefore often have to wait weeks or months for their deliveries and have major problems calculating the prices for their customers.
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