Higher wood fiber costs for pulpmills worldwide in 2023

Global pulp prices have fallen steadily since late 2022, when they reached record highs. The most significant decline has been for hardwood pulp, traded at a substantial discount to softwood pulp.

Despite declines in pulp prices over the past year, wood fiber costs have not experienced the same downward trend. On the contrary, tighter residual supply resulting from lower lumber production has kept wood chip prices high in many markets.

The index comprising wood fiber prices from 17 countries worldwide increased about 12% in one year to over $112/BDMT in the 2Q/23.

The Global Hardwood Fiber Price Index (HFPI) has also increased substantially in the past few years to reach a ten-year high of about $113/BDMT (bone dry metric ton) in the early summer of 2023—up 44% from 2020 to 2023. The HFPI index is higher than the SFPI index for the first time in four years.

Hardwood chip import prices in China and Japan have increased since 2020 but relatively less than in other major global markets, up 20% in China and only 1% in Japan. Despite the modest recent rise in the price of wood fiber in Japan, the country’s pulp mills still have some of the highest fiber costs in the world.

Source: Wood Resources International