Forecast: North American lumber demand down 6-7% in 2023

North America lumber demand should be lower by 6-7% in 2023, with the first half of the year being most troublesome. The growth in US South lumber capacity has been incredible. From 2018 to 2022, there were about 7 billion bf (11 million m3) of new capacity installations. However, there has only been a 50% increase in output, meaning that with delays in startup, coupled with COVID issues, there is a lot more production that is still going to come from existing projects. Based on data from Forisk, they indicated that 1.3 billion bf sawmill capacity came ...