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The Competition of the Swedish Forest Raw Material

How will the supply and demand for forest raw materials change in the coming years, and what consequences will this have? This is being analysed by the project Competition for Forest Raw Materials, which is running from 2025 to 2026. The first phase of the project was carried out from 2019 to 2021. Read the reports from that phase below.
Konkurrensen Om Svenska Skogsråvaran

The competition for forest raw materials is expected to increase in the coming years, as more and more sectors want to utilise forests and their residual products to replace fossil raw materials.

Examples of areas addressed by the project

  • How large will the future supply of forest raw materials be?

  • What quantities of forest raw materials will be in demand in different sectors and what quality is needed for different applications?

  • What alternatives to forest raw materials are available for different applications where ‘green atoms’ are in demand?

  • What criteria may determine who is entitled to the resource?

The first phase of the project was carried out between 2019 and 2021. It presented results on the future supply of forest raw materials, demand from different sectors and what the future balance might look like. These results will be updated, expanded, and deepened, as many of the external conditions have changed. One example of the changed conditions is that the price of wood chips has risen by more than 70 per cent between 2022 and 2024.

The aim is for the results of the project to be useful for decision-makers in the district heating sector, but also in the forestry and forest industry, the energy and transport sectors, relevant authorities, the Government Offices and political decision-makers at national level.

The project will

  1. Report the results of the latest and most up-to-date research on the effects of forestry and the carbon balance of forests.

  2. Increase knowledge about how the conditions for Swedish forestry and the availability of various forest raw materials may change.

  3. Identify and analyse future demand for biomass and other ‘green carbon atoms’ in different user sectors and for different applications.

  4. Discuss and analyse different principles for how forest raw materials can be best utilised, who has the right to them, and the consequences of different approaches.

  5. Compare supply with demand and assess how the supply balance will develop, focusing on different forest raw materials as well as the energy, industry and transport sectors.

The programme will run until the end of 2026, but partial results will be presented on an ongoing basis.

Reports from the first stage of the project are available below.