Mostrando mensaje 174     < Anterior | Siguiente > Responder a este mensaje Asunto: [dbn] Planet Ark News Story Fecha: Miercoles, 14 de Septiembre, 2005  03:38:35 (+1000) Autor: info <info @.......ar> Dear DBN, www.dbn.org.ar thought you would be interested in reading this Reuters article from www.planetark.org Katrina Rebuilding to Rekindle Brazil Wood Exports http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=32479 COMMENTS SAO PAULO - US reconstruction efforts in the wake of Hurricane Katrina have begun to snap Brazil's wood export industry out of its worst crisis in decades. The US Congress has already approved $10 billion in federal funds to help rebuild the devastated US Gulf Coast region and demand for construction and housing materials of any kind is due to rise as the flood waters recede. "The United States is our main market, 50 percent of our exports go there," Luis de Toledo Barros, president of the Brazilian Wood Industry Association (Abimci), told Reuters. Brazilian plywoods account for 40 percent of the Eastern US market. Pine plywood -- a basic material of the US housing market -- rose 15 percent in the past week and a half to more than $230 a cubic meter in Brazil's southern ports, the Brazilian Wood Industry Association (Abimci) said. Total revenue from Brazilian wood shipments in 2004 reached $3 billion. About 65 percent of Brazil's wood exports are from cultivated pine forests in the south, mostly in the form of plywood sheets. The rest comes from northern and northeastern ports and are tropical hardwood products from native forests. "I haven't seen any new contracts since the hurricane but I suspect US demand will revive prices. We ship a lot of tropical wood products to the US -- doors, window frames, flooring, even tropical plywood," said Guilherme Carvalho, technical director of Wood Export Industry Association of Para. Para is the lower of two states in northern Brazil that make up the vast majority of the Amazon Basin and is the No. 3 wood exporter after Parana and Santa Catarina in the south. But Brazil's wood industry leaders say this will not jeopardize the already precarious survival of the world's largest tropical forecast, the Amazon, which has suffered some of its worst deforestation rates in recent years. "Long before Katrina, the state and federal governments tightened up control of the logging industry around the Amazon," said Barros. HARD TIMES "We used to export 100,000 cubic meters of wood a month to the US about a year ago but that has fallen off to around 40,000 because of the crisis," said Barros, who spoke by telephone from the southern state of Parana, Brazil's main wood exporter. Like much of its export sector, Brazil's wood industry has been plagued over the last year by high production costs -- needed to plant, manage and harvest forests -- and a weakening dollar against the Brazilian real, which reduces export revenue in local currency terms. "We should have no trouble returning exports to that level in a few months without any negative effects on domestic supply," Barros said. Brazil's housing market is unlikely to suffer significant price rises due to export demand for woods as bricks and mortar are the basic components of most domestic residential construction and are better-suited for the tropical country where termites are common. "The reconstruction efforts along the US Gulf Coast where Katrina hit are going to help our wood industry through its worst crisis in decades," Barros said. Story by Reese Ewing REUTERS NEWS SERVICE ============================================================= 'World Environment News' is copyright (c) Planet Ark 2002 All headlines are copyright (c) Reuters 2002 =========================================================== Doing environmental research? Search our news archives at: http://www.planetark.org/searchhome.cfm -~--------------------------------------------------------------------~- Consultas recomendadas: * Comunicación Audiovisual: http://egrupos.net/hs/28 * Cursos de Inglés: http://egrupos.net/hs/32 * Estudios de Master: http://egrupos.net/hs/79 -~--------------------------------------------------------------------~- -~--------------------------------------------------------------------~- CREA GRATIS TU PROPIA RED SOCIAL DE CONTENIDOS O participa en las muchas ya creadas. ¡Es lo último, es útil y divertido! ¿A qué esperas? Visita ya mismo http://es.corank.com/ --~------------------------------------------------------------------~-- Compra o vende de manera diferente en www.egrupos.net