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The Southeast’s timber industry is on an upswing and a new tool rolled out by the United States Department of Agriculture’s Forest Service could give it an extra boost. Ever since the creation of the USDA Southeast Regional Climate Hub in Raleigh, the region has led the nation in timber production and sales. However, competition with South America and Canada drove production down in the past decade.

In North Carolina alone, forest products accounted for $19.4 billion in value of shipments in 2007, declined to $19.1 billion in 2008, slipped to $18.3 billion in 2009 and dropped to $14.8 in 2011, with 2010 not accounted for by North Carolina Forestry.

“Competition from South America and Canada put pressure on timber prices,” says Climate Hub Director and USDA Forester Steve McNulty.”It was cheaper to provide raw goods from abroad. Then the recession didn’t help.”

But numbers show things are beginning to change. From 2012 to 2013, the value of wood delivered to sawmills grew by $44.2 million (6.1 percent) to over $774.9 million. That doesn’t account for wood product manufacturing, pulpwood, veneer logs or composite.

The Southeast Regional Climate Hub has rolled out a Template for Assessing Change Impacts and Management Options (TACCIMO), which allows forestry consultants to plug forest data into a web-based tool which puts out information about potential climate impacts in just a few minutes.

From the Triangle Business Journal: https://www.bizjournals.com/triangle/blog/2014/07/climate-hub-tool-could-push-southeasts-timber.html