Thirty to forty years ago Europe was in a similar situation to that which we see in China today: the middle class was growing and house prices skyrocketed. The solution was to shift from heavy to lightweight construction. China could do the same thing.
Living conditions in China have improved since reform was initiated in 1978. The number of people living in poverty – living on less than US$1 per day – has decreased from 490 million in the early 1980s to 88 million in 2002. Now China’s target is to quadruple its GDP between 2000-2020. Of course this means an additional increase in construction – which in turn means enormous opportunities for the wood industry.
China is already the world’s biggest building market. More than 10 million flats are completed annually, a production rate that has continued unabated for the past 15 years. Concrete, brick, steel and glass are the predominant materials used to build the blocks of flats where Chinese city dwellers normally live. Timber in buildings is scarce and the domestic supply of forest is extremely limited.
“Building systems and methods in China are unsustainable in the long term,” said Jan Söderlind, managing director of the Nordic Timber Council. “Builders use too much material per square metre of living space because of heavyweight building methods, and at the same time energy consumption for heating and cooling is very high. We are working to bring about sustainable development in the construction sector with lightweight building methods based on wood as a strategic building system, which in turn means an opening for the wood products industry.”
Wood can help to solve problems for Chinese construction; its building material and energy crises and need for sustainable material solutions. It can also meet commercial needs, raising quality in building and housing and improving cost efficiency. Rough estimates suggest a more than 50 million m3 per year could be used in construction in Chinese cities.
Operating in China
The Nordic Timber Council started operations in China in 1994, when it was founded.
“We established contact at the government authority level and quickly built up networks in political circles,” said Mr Söderlind. “It was – and still is today – more effective to deal with ministers, representatives for standardisation and norm activities, provincial governors and local mayors with arguments related to good resource use and building systems than to carry out pure marketing campaigns aimed at import companies. First we have to eliminate irrelevant legal obstacles and associated attitudes among influential decision-makers in the centrally governed China – then we can effectively market wood to professional target groups within the construction sector such as real estate developers, architects and planners.”
Between 2002-2004 the work to remove legal obstacles was successful, with product standardisation for European tree species/structural timber as well as for building norms for applications using wood in construction. To increase the effectiveness of its promotion efforts and lobbying for new markets, European Wood, an alliance between France, Germany, Austria and the Nordic Timber Council, was established in June 2004.
Last month this alliance was expanded in China with the initiative called European Wood. Colleagues in Canada (Canada Wood Group) and the US (American Forest & Paper Association), together with European Wood signed a co-operation agreement with the Ministry of Public Security responsible for fire laws and codes in China. A joint effort was initiated to effectively eliminate fire laws, standards and norms that prevent the use of wood in Chinese construction. That work is ongoing and, for the timber industry in China, the future looks bright.
