A study is under way to examine the potential benefits of using electronic tags to trace construction products through the supply chain.
The £52,000 six-month project led by the Building Research Establishment is partly-funded by the DTI and backed by the Construction Products Association (CPA).
Although unlikely to include raw timber, bigger and more expensive items such as panel sections for timber frame housing and lorry-loads of roof trusses may benefit from tagging, according to CPA industry affairs director John Tebbit.
He said tags, linked to information communication technology, may help items arrive on site on time and crack down on theft.
But neither the Trussed Rafter Association nor the Timber Frame Industry Association (TFIA) thinks tagging will be of much use, with site thefts not proving a big problem. TFIA marketing director Charles Grant said: ‘There are an awful lot of things which are more important.’
