Timber supply issues could last into 2023 the Victorian peak body for builders says

Government intervention is needed to assist industry to import timber and arrest supply issues that could last into 2023, the president of Master Builders Victoria says.

Government intervention is needed to assist industry to import timber and arrest supply issues that could last into 2023, the president of Master Builders Victoria says.

Victorian president Mark Little said builders were waiting up to nine months for trusses and up to sixteens weeks for the wood used for rafters.

“The shortfall (of timber) was meant to ease up at the end of 2021. At the end of 2021 it was meant to ease up in the first half of 2022. Now in 2022 it seems like it will run into 2023,” Mr Little said.

“Building a home timber is main one because you get a concrete slab down and you can’t do anything else until you get a frame up.”

Mr Little said timber could be sourced from European mills because housing construction went dormant across winter in the northern hemisphere.

Builder Mark Little. Picture: Peter Ristevski

He said the cost of getting a shipping container, that would be used to carry imported wood to Australia, had risen from about $4000 to up to $22,000 since the Covid pandemic hit.

Locally, Geelong builders were told this month that timber prices would rise further from March, including timber cladding (up 12 per cent) and pine (up 10 per cent).

In Victoria during the three months to December 2021, building and construction accounted for 30 per cent of all insolvencies, according to the MBV.

More than half of building and construction business insolvencies in that time were due to creditor wind-ups.

MBV acting chief executive Michela Lihou said: “With building contract prices locked in, the large and unanticipated surge in the prices of many building items such as timber and steel-based products means that many of our members are finding that the cost of completing work is more costly than expected.”

This week the federal government committed $86m, to be spent across the next five years, to

establish more wood plantations.

Mr Little said: “It’s a great initiative for long term security however we are still going to feel the hurt short term (without immediate intervention form governments).”

Victorian Liberal Senator Sarah Henderson said government backed wood plantations would ensure forestry jobs in the Barwon region were supported.

“This program is about getting more trees in the ground and ensuring forest industries have a long-term future,” Senator Henderson said.

“This is the largest direct investment of any Australian Government in plantation establishment for more than 30 years.

“We want to partner with Victoria to grow this renewable, sustainable industry so that it can continue to create jobs and deliver quality, Australian-made products to markets.

Corangamite Labor MP Libby Coker said it would be her “personal mission” to develop a national environmentally sustainable plantation and timber manufacturing strategy if she’s re-elected.

Originally published as Timber supply issues could last into 2023 the Victorian peak body for builders says