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European Commission investigates suspected Russian birch ply imports


The European Commission has launched an investigation into the suspected circumvention of anti-dumping measures imposed on imports of birch plywood products originating in Russia.


The focus is on imports


consigned from Turkey and Kazakhstan, regardless of their declared origin, and the potential measures to tackle the circumvention. The investigation takes place as a result of the concerns that have arisen about some Russian birch plywood exporters using third countries as transit to avoid


the anti-dumping measures and sanctions on the import of wood products from Russia and Belarus.


A request for an


investigation was lodged in July by the Woodstock Consortium, which is comprised of Paged-Pisz from Poland’s Paged Group and Latvian group Latvijas Finieris, supported by the main EU industry as well as leading companies such as Finnish company UPM Plywood. Woodstock provided the


European Commission with prima-facie evidence and examples of attempts to go


around duties and sanctions imposed by the EU. “The fact is that neither of the two investigated countries was ever known as a significant birch plywood producer and until recently imported little to no birch plywood to the EU at all,” said Woodstock. “Yet, following the


imposition of the 2021 duties against Russian producers, and the 2022 entry into force of import-related sanctions against Russian producers, imports from Turkey massively and demonstrably surged. Similarly, Kazakhstan


Fletcher Building orders Fine OSB plant from Dieffenbacher and gluing systems.


Above: Hamish McBeath, Chief Executive Building Products at Fletcher Building (left) and Dieffenbacher CEO Christian Dieffenbacher (right) sign the delivery contract for Fletcher Building’s new CEBRO Fine OSB plant


New Zealand’s Fletcher Building Ltd has ordered a complete CEBRO plant for the production of Fine OSB from the German machine and plant manufacturer Dieffenbacher.


The plant will be built at


Fletcher Building’s Laminex site in Taupo, in the centre of the country’s North Island. The new plant will include Dieffenbacher’s new Belt Dryer.


The new Belt Dryer


is an example of how Dieffenbacher technology will support the sustainability of the new plant.


It is designed with a low thermal energy consumption, works at lower temperatures than drum dryers and can use low-calorific energy from the waste heat of other plant components that would otherwise remain unused. Furthermore, it can be used in combination with cogeneration.


WBPI | August/September 2023 | www.wbpionline.com Fletcher Building’s new


CEBRO plant will have the flexibility to produce Fine OSB (an OSB core layer covered top and bottom by layers of particleboard) and conventional OSB.


Dieffenbacher will also supply an energy plant, a debarking line, purchased material infeed, strand production, a MAIER Impact Mill, the screening and air grading, material recovery, glue preparation, glue dosing


The project will also include a forming station and forming line, a CPS+ continuous press with Press Emission Control System, raw board handling, pneumatic systems, electrics and automation, the digitalization solution EVORIS and the digital service platform MyDIEFFENBACHER. In addition, Dieffenbacher subsidiary B. Maier Zerkleinerungstechnik GmbH is responsible for engineering the entire wood yard up to the strander. The new CEBRO plant will replace a particleboard production line featuring an almost 50-year-old single- opening press supplied by DIEFFENBACHER to Fletcher Building in 1974.


“It’s remarkable that our old press served us so well and for so long,” said Paul Thorn, Fletcher Wood Products, capital works manager at Fletcher Building. Construction in Taupo will begin in early 2024. Start-up is scheduled for the fourth quarter of the same year, and full-scale production by mid-2025.


went from zero to tens of thousands of cubic meters.” Imports of the product under investigation are being made subject to registration in order to ensure that, should the investigation result in findings of circumvention, anti-dumping duties of an appropriate amount, not exceeding the residual duty imposed by Implementing Regulation (EU) 2021/1930, can be levied from the date on which registration of such imports was imposed. The investigation is due


to be completed within nine months.


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