The export of the wood sector of Bosnia and Herzegovina last year amounted to 1.7 billion BAM or 30.2 percent more than in 2020. The export growth trend continued in the first four months of this year, when exports totaled 608.05 million BAM, or 22.3 percent more than in the same period in 2021.
In the first four months, the export of forest assortments and sawn timber increased especially, it was said at the fourth session of the Assembly of the Association of Wood Industry and Forestry of the Foreign Trade Chamber of BiH.
Imports of all product groups are also higher in 2021 as in the four months of this year. especially forest assortments and sawn timber.
The most important export markets are Germany, Croatia, Italy, Serbia, Slovenia, Austria, the Netherlands and France. Most were imported from Croatia, Serbia, Austria, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovenia, Germany, Hungary, Romania, Turkey, Italy.
The coverage of imports by exports in 2021 was 345.9 percent, and for the first four months of this year 304.1 percent.
“Despite the fact that the wood industry is a surplus branch of the economy and has a high-quality final product that is exported, producers do not have any institutional support, contributions to wages are very high, and there is an increasingly present deficit of professional labor. The prices of raw materials are constantly increasing, and the raw material is exported, so they are forced to import forest assortments and sawn timber in order to achieve the contracted export,” they say from the Association of Wood Industry and Forestry.
Manufacturers are worried about what the situation will be like in the second half of this year, due to the ever-increasing increase in the prices of energy and raw materials and the uncertain demand for products on the EU market, especially in Germany.
They appeal to the entity governments to reduce contributions to salaries, in order to increase the income of the employed from these funds and thus keep them to stay in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
