yesterday at 15:58
,Austria
The price of standing Norway spruce has tripled in three years: from 40 euros per cubic meter in 2021 to 120 euros recorded in the first quarter of 2026. Added to this is an increase in construction raw material costs of up to 35% in the last six months, with heavy effects on the entire timber supply chain. The hardest hit are the sawmills and first-processing companies, squeezed between ever-more-expensive logs and sawn timber that has not risen proportionally: the weakest link in an already strained chain.
It was in this context that the conference From Forest to Finished Product was held in Asiago, bringing together businesses, technicians, researchers and institutions to assess the crisis and prospects of the timber market. In Veneto the sector’s artisan supply chain comprises 8,872 companies and 20,856 employees, yet it is experiencing a phase of strong instability, further aggravated by geopolitical tensions affecting international raw-material markets.
One of the most critical structural issues is the progressive disappearance of Veneto sawmills, which reduces the territory’s ability to build a genuine regional short supply chain. There are only 385 forestry and artisan sawmill businesses in Veneto, with fewer than a thousand employees in total: figures that paint a production fabric increasingly thin compared with the potential of the available forest resource.
The issue of local valorisation emerged forcefully in the debate, especially in light of recent events. After Storm Vaia and the bark-beetle outbreak, huge quantities of felled timber were not processed locally:
«Too much wood left the region unprocessed; too much added value ended up abroad.»
A loss that weighs doubly on a region that possesses considerable forest resources, yet where harvesting and utilisation remain below sustainable potential.
Further complicating the picture is the fragmentation of Veneto’s forest ownership, made up of numerous small private plots that hinder efficient forest management. Alessandra Stefani pointed to the creation of networks among small owners and modern governance as a viable way to increase local supply and reduce dependence on imports, which continues to grow while final demand for timber remains weak and the market shows signs of stagnation.
On the economic front, the situation of sawmills is described as particularly critical. According to Professor Davide Pettenella, these companies suffer more than any others because processed timber is worth less today than in the past, in a market that does not adequately reward local processing. Paola Zanotto denounced near-zero margins, suffocating bureaucracy, foreign competition and fragmented land ownership as factors that make the sector increasingly unsustainable.
Faced with this scenario, Confartigianato put forward concrete proposals, starting with a Veneto Wood Pact to strengthen the short supply chain through supply-chain contracts, incentives for forest road infrastructure, support for sawmills and premiums for certified Veneto timber. The association also calls for the timber supply chain to become a priority on the regional political agenda, with the establishment of a permanent regional roundtable equipped with operational tools: quarterly price monitoring, mapping of small and medium-sized enterprise needs, and measures to consolidate the short supply chain.
An opportunity could arise from the national housing strategy, which could promote construction timber and residues destined for energy biomass, opening new market outlets for local companies. For this opportunity to translate into concrete benefits for the territory, however, sector operators argue that a structural change of direction is needed: less unprocessed timber leaving the region and more local processing, together with greater coordination among supply-chain actors.
