Global Wood Chip Price Indices being launched

More than 80 million tons of wood chips, valued at almost ten billion US dollars, are traded annually in the open market worldwide and the shipment volumes are increasing. The vast majority of traded wood chips are currently utilized for pulp production, but the volumes used to generate energy are growing.
FOEX, who produces a portfolio of well-established pulp, paper and pellet indices for a number of years and WRI, an internationally recognized forest industry consulting firm specialising in evaluations of global forest resources and wood raw-material prices, including prices of wood chips, have joined forces to launch global wood chip price indices.

As for all price benchmarks in FOEX’s PIX-index family, the indices will be based on a large number of actual trades and the data will be collected from both sellers and buyers of wood chips. Initially, the price indices will be published separately for pulp and energy end-uses. Detailed index specifications will be published after discussions with the interested parties have been concluded. The new PIX-index system’s launch is planned for early 2011.