Profits of largest timber companies in Russia on an upward trend

The 100 largest companies of the timber industry of Russia have provided 56% of the revenues of the entire Russian forestry sector in 2016.

According to the conclusions given in the annual rating of TopWood 100 of the Russian Forestry Industry published by WhatWood, the revenues of the 100 largest timber industry companies of Russia for the year increased by 13.2% to 918.6 billion rubles. The remaining participants of the timber industry in the country are medium and small businesses with annual revenues up to 1.6 billion rubles.

The economy of Russia declined for two consecutive years: -3.7% (y / y) in 2015 and -0.2% (y / y) in 2016. After a severe shock experienced by Russian businesses and the entire economy in 2014, 2015 and 2016 again presented challenges to Russian timber industry workers.

The US dollar against the Russian ruble reached a historic peak of 82 rubles / dollar in January 2016. However, for the entire year 2016 the ruble strengthened, reaching an average level of 63 rubles / dollar by the end of the year and continued to decline in 2017. This variant of events was unpredictable and unexpected for timber producers, who were guided by higher export earnings when planning budgets for 2016.

According to WhatWood, increasing production volumes and selling them to foreign markets is an obvious and predictable trend in the Russian timber industry in recent years. The volume of sales of forest products for export grew by double-digit figures for two years: in 2015, the volume of plywood exports from Russia increased by 12.5%, while in 2016 declined by 15.5%, MDF / HDF - by 113.3% and 35.6%, OSB - by 157.1% and 75.0%, chipboard - by 24.1% and 104.1%, sawn timber - by 6.9% and 10.7%, respectively.

In 2016, the Russian timber industry helped the favorable situation in world markets: the weakening of the dollar to regional currencies and the high demand for wood products in China. The high rates of house building in the United States created prerequisites for stabilizing global competition, which contributed to higher prices for products. The index of industrial production in woodworking of Russia rebounded in 2016 by 35% (y / y),while  in 2015 there was a decrease of 35.7%.

It is obvious that the contribution of the forest sector to the Russian economy is growing. This is due to the opening of new enterprises and organic growth in existing industries. The situation in the sector is improving, showing a cut in the large forest business. The total net profit of the 100 largest timber companies in Russia has grown over the year by more than 2.5 times to 128 billion rubles.

Investments in the fixed capital of mechanical woodworking enterprises exceeded the similar indicator for the pulp and paper industry (this was twice in 11 years: in 2005 and 2011). In 2016 the greatest inflow of investments fell on the production of MDF / HDF (due to large investment projects implemented by the Austrian company Egger, the Russian "Russian laminate" in the Smolensk region, the Turkish company Kastamonu in Tatarstan) and for sawmilling ("Ustyansky LPK, Titan ","Pomorskiy sawmill company" implement large investment projects for the production of sawn timber in the Arkhangelsk region with a total investment of more than 9 billion rubles).