Page 5 - 5261 OutofWoods

From Our President

Scott Gies, Gies Timber and Land Inc.

Wow, I not sure about how things are in your part of the Several of you have asked us for updates on what we're
SWPA geographical area but in NE FL/ SE GA it is wet!!! It seeing in the market with China lately, hopefully this email
has rained just about every day from the second week of will give you a little better insight. As always please feel
May, to say it has been challenging is an understatement. free to contact us if you have any questions and we will
Weather is just one of the many factors affecting our busi- keep you up-to-date as things progress.
nesses that we cannot control. For the most part all the wood
receiving facilities are running at a level where we aren’t fight- First, I think it's important to note the market in China is in
ing quotas, just can’t get into the woods to fulfill the orders. relatively good shape with normal inventories and strong
usage (off-take). Our long term outlook remains confident
I noticed that GP has announced the opening of a 300 million and we are full steam ahead with our new 20 acre site,
foot sawmill in the Albany, Ga area it is set to start construction which will be operational this winter. We had a few
in late 2018 with completion about a year later. Good news for setbacks on the new site location this summer, but we
the loggers in that part of Georgia, another option. believe we have those issues under control now. More on
this as we progress.
I recently had a conversation with Don Whitlock manager of
Fiber International, about the effects that tariffs might have on Roughly two months ago, China decided to put an end to
wood flow to China, we talked for a bit and the next morning the illegal logs coming out of Charleston and other ports
he sent out a group email to all his suppliers. I have attached his which were using the "Hong Kong Phyto" loophole to
email for all to read, very interesting piece. bypass Chinese fumigation rules for bark-on logs. While-
most of this problem appears to have worked through the
Be safe and I keep telling myself the rain will stop one day.
market, no doubt costing certain exporters a lot of money, it
Scott has heightened China's awareness of the (cont. on pg. 20)

Vol 29 Issue 3 2018 l SWPA Out of the Woods l swpa.ag 5