Forestry sector hopes fumigation alternative unlocks Indian market

Logs stacked after an industry operation. Photo / RNZ - File image

RNZ

The forestry sector is hopeful exports to India will resume now the Environmental Protection Authority has approved a new fumigation product for export logs.

The quarter of a billion-dollar Indian market collapsed three years ago after the use of the environmentally harmful product methyl bromide was phased out.

India will not accept logs that have not been fumigated with it - but the EPA has just approved an alternative product ethanedinitrile or EDN.

Forest Owners Association president Grant Dodson said it was vital government ministers urgently go to India to try to re-open the export log market there

"It's vital to get back into India, the longer we are out of that market, the harder it will be to get back in.

"India is currently the sixth-largest economy in the world, but is widely predicted to be global number three, behind only China and the USA, by 2030."

Other log exporting countries, such as Canada, had been heavily investing in their Indian export market, Dodson said.

"These countries will also work to keep us out for as long as they can, but with EDN approval here, we can now confidently go back to India and begin to compete on equal terms again.

"We still have to get through regional consent processes at the export fumigation locations here in New Zealand, before EDN can be used for any destination."

- RNZ