The Status of Wood Products Supply and Demand in Ethiopia: A Review

Abstract

This review paper focused on the Ethiopian wood products demand and supply situation in the current and future time period. Fuel wood and industrial round wood products were considered in this review paper. The reviewed paper showed that the wood demand in Ethiopia growing fast due to increasing of purchasing power, economic growth, middle class, urbanization and construction boom. In 2015, the fuel wood demand estimated about 120.4 million m 3 RWE and industrial wood estimated approximately 8.4 million m 3 RWE. To meet the needs of the growing demand, a supply of 4.4 million cubic meters of industrial wood will need to close the gaps by the year 2033. Demand and supply gap of wood products showed high disparity and grow from time to time. The round wood gap estimated 1.8 million m 3 in 2013 and 4.4 million m 3 gap of supply by the year 2033. The total volume of wood products demand estimated 1.2 million m3 RWE in 2015 and 13.9 m 3 RWE by the year 2040. In the past years most of wood product supplied from woodlot and natural forest by logging while now it decreases and substitute by import products. In 2015, the country imported 3.006 million m 3 RWE of different industrial wood products. The imported products worth nearly USD 182.53 million and the domestic production was estimated about 5.43 million m 3 in 2015. The low level of industrial wood supply from domestic production is compensated by a large volume of imports. Between the years 2000-2013, the country has been imported 170,721.3 tons and estimate worth of 159 million USD and the import bill will reach 3 billion USD by the year 2035. The country also imported an average 65,680m 3 /year of different industrial wood products between the years 2007-2015. The main imported wood products were sawn wood, plywood and furniture. Ethiopia export small quantity of wood products. The trade balance between import and export showed that a negative trade balance between the years 2007-2015. The total estimated amount of import was 120,000m RWE and export about 35,000m 3 RWE. To narrow down demand-supply discrepancy and substitution of import volume, encouragement of investment is a crucial solution in forestry.

Cost benefit analysis for Grevillea robusta in Ethiopia: linking establishment of a breeding seedling orchard to the economic returns of quality plantings

“…These estimates were based on a log recovery rate of 36% from roundwood to sawnwood volume (Abebe & Holm, 2003) and a price based on an import cost of sawnwood of 455 USD per m 3 (Girma, 2021). Only harvested timber with DBH > 26 cm was included in the analysis.…”