Because of a lack of competitively priced wood fiber in China, the two pulp companies with the largest pulp mills in the country, Asia Pacific Resources International Ltd (APRIL) and Asia Pulp and Paper (APP), are procuring much of their wood fiber needs from out-of-country sources. As a consequence, importation of wood chips to China has surged the past few years. In just five years, the import value for wood chips has increased from 180 million dollars in 2008 to 1.3 billion dollars in 2012, and this year the estimated import value could be close to 1.5 billion dollars, WRQ said.
It has only been a matter of time before China became the largest importer of hardwood chips in the world. In the second quarter of 2013, China surpassed Japan with the record importation of almost 2.4 million m3 of chips, WRQ noted.
