Bosnian walnut log breaks record at timber auction
A walnut log from Bosnia-Herzegovina fetched the highest price at this year's auction of valuable timber in the northern town of Slovenj Gradec, the largest such in Central Europe, going for €16,500. The auction netted an estimated €2 million in its first round.
The 19th annual auction attracted 611 sellers, mostly from Slovenia, who offered 6,523 logs for sale, totalling nearly 7,000 cubic metres, which is somewhat less than last year, CE Report quotes The Slovenia Times.
Nearly half of the 55 buyers were from Slovenia, with the rest from eleven European countries. They put in more than 17,000 bids.
Around 20% of the timber will go to China, the buyers taking part through Slovenian intermediaries, auction organiser Jože Jeromel told reporters.
A large share of the wood will be processed in Slovenia, he said.
This year's auction did not fetch the record prices seen in previous years, but the organisers are nonetheless pleased.
The most expensive log, 11 cubic metres of walnut from Bosnia-Herzegovina, went to an Austrian buyer for €16,500, followed by a log of the quilted sycamore maple from Croatia that fetched €13,300. Another Bosnian walnut log went for €12,200 and an oak log from Mislinja Valley in Slovenia fetched almost €12,000.
The quilted sycamore maple reached the highest price per cubic metre, at €7,200.
"The buyer of the quilted sycamore maple is a Croatian company, while the biggest walnut logs were bought by an Austrian company," Jeromel said, adding that the latter buys large logs to be cut in Germany and used for furniture worldwide, including in Japan.
In previous years they never auctioned off less than 94% of the timber on offer in the first round, while this time only some 80% were sold in the first round.
Some 780 cubic metres of spruce did not sell but some bids have already been placed for the second round of the auction.
According to Slovenia Forest Service, some 4.6 million cubic metres of trees were felled in the country last year.
