Category: Weekly Softwood Lumber Blog

  • US Pending Home Sales

    Contracts to buy previously owned U.S. homes rose in March for the first time in nine months, a sign the housing market could be stabilizing after suffering a setback from a rise in interest rates and a severe winter. The National Association of Realtors said on Monday its Pending Home Sales Index, based on contracts…

  • Port Hawkesbury to Convert to Sugar

    Nova Scotia’s Port Hawkesbury Paper hopes to move ahead with a demonstration sugar extracting operation within a year. The mill has commissioned an engineering study that is nearly complete for the plant, which would be located at the Point Tupper (Nova Scotia) mill site, according to Atlantic Farm Focus Thursday. They’ve been working on the…

  • Plum Creek Develops

    Plum Creek Timber, out of Seattle, WA, and one of the largest private landowners in the nation, has begun developing a 2,000-acre “mega site” in south Georgia for future industrial use. Speaking to stock analysts on April 28, Plum Creek CEO Rick Holley said the property, which he called the “Heart of Georgia mega site,”…

  • China, Wildfires

    Further to this week’s feature story in your Madison’s Lumber Reporter, China has mobilized nearly 3,000 people to quench two raging forest fires in the country’s southwest and north, said Xinhua Friday. Authorities in the southwestern Yunnan Province have mobilized 1,720 people and two helicopters to put out a forest blaze in Dali City. The…

  • Canfor Invests

    Canfor will invest $30 million at its Polar facility in Bear Lake, north of Prince George, BC, to replace the existing sawmill and to produce higher-value products, company officials said Wednesday at the company’s annual general meeting in Prince George. Canfor will also pump $6 million into its Fort St. John sawmill’s log yard stabilization…