Wood packaging – Data 2017-2018

Market and types. The most used in the “packaging for the transport of goods” category, wood packaging is widely used across the entire manufacturing sector. Which is why the sector trend has always been closely related to industry trends. Barbara Iascone

Wood packaging is divided into three categories (the subdivision is taken from Imballaggio in Cifre): industrial packaging, wooden crates, and pallets.
Industrial packaging, which represents a category within which different types of packaging fall, deserves a side note. It in fact contains structures for the transport of machinery or plant facilities, that is to say crates and cages designed and built based on the characteristics and dimensions of the products they are to contain.
Still referring to Imballaggio in Cifre, this listing also includes the reels used to wrap wires and cables of various kinds (electric, metal, fibre optic etc.), but also boxes for containing liquor and fine wines as well as cork stoppers.
According to 2017 figures, approximately 2,060 wood packaging manufacturing companies are operational: 49% produce pallets, 37% produce industrial packaging (including cork stoppers) while the remaining 14% comprise packaging companies serving the fruit and vegetable sector. The 2017 turnover for the wood packaging sector is up 2%, reaching 1,598 million euros.
 
Market data: production and dissemination Final balance for 2017
The final figures for 2017 showed the wood packaging sector registered an increase in production in tonnes of 3.7% compared to the previous year, exceeding 2,600t/000.
In 2017, as in 2016, the only wooden containers to register a drop in production were fruit and vegetable crates.

Foreign trade is seen to be up compared to 2016, both in terms of imports (+4.9%) and exports (+14.6%).
The most representative category, in terms of weight, remains that of pallets, accounting for 73% of the total. In 2017 pallets registered a 4.9% growth in production, bringing production to over 1,900 t/000.
18.4% of the production of wooden pallets is destined to the beverage and liquid food sector, 20.4% to the food sector, 19.4% to non-food consumer goods (cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, TV, telephony, household appliances, products for the home in general), 5% is for chemical products (including domestic detergents) and, finally, 36.9% comes under the “other” listing (mechanical and electromechanical products, building materials).

As for industrial packaging, which represents 20% of the entire wood packaging sector in terms of weight, in 2017 production increased by 2.9%, bringing the tons of industrial packaging to 514 t/000.
Exports, after the drops registered in 2015 and the stability of 2106, return to growth with a +16.3%; imports instead registered a -0.2% compared to 2016. Apparent use settled at around 543 t/000, with a growthrate of 1.2%.
The destination of use of industrial packaging remains the prerogative of boxes and containers for transporting bulky goods (89%); 10% is accounted for by staves, boxes for tools or spare parts and ad hoc cases, while cork stoppers account for 1%.
As already mentioned, wooden crates (7% of the entire sector) are in continuous decline. In 2017, their production settled at 195 t/000, -4.9% compared to the previous year. 92% of this type of packaging is destined for the fruit and vegetable sector, the remaining 8% for other sectors such as fresh seafood and the plant nursery sector.

Estimated developments for 2018
According to initial estimates for the year 2018 - at the moment these are forecasts - the wood packaging sector should close with a 3% increase in turnover, reaching around € 1.6 billion.
In quantitative terms, production should remain fairly stable. As far as foreign trade is concerned, based on ISTAT data processed for the first 11 months of 2018, exports grew by 2%, thus exceeding the 200 t/000 threshold, while imports should fall by 4%, 466 t/000.
Based on these elements, the apparent consumption of the total wood packaging in Italy should show a decrease of 0.7%.
Also on the basis of first data readings, production should grow by 1% for industrial packaging, and only by 0.4% for pallets, while the decline in crates continues.
These forecasts are corroberated by the slowdown that the Italian manufacturing sector seems to have suffered in 2018.
 
Raw material price quotations
In 2018, the average price quotations of the listings relating to the raw materials used to produce wood packaging, monitored by the Milan Chamber of Commerce, grew with rates ranging from 9.3% to 11%. These considerable raw material price increases go to support the increase in turnover in the sector which, as we have seen, for 2018 is expected to grow more than the production expressed in tonnes.
The most significant price increases concern the raw materials used to produce pallets, which will grow by +11%.
This growth is also confirmed by the survey of the CRIL Super Index (Wood Packaging and Logistics Research Center), which for the 2018 averages set against 2017 registers a +10.3%.
The Super Index is a mathematical average that derives from the selling prices of the pallets registered with the CRIL associated manufacturing companies.

Since last year, thanks to an active collaboration with Assoimballaggi (the group that deals with packaging in the FederlegnoArredo association), the Italian Packaging Institute in its monitoring of raw material prices, also includes the trend of this Super Index, which is made on a quarterly basis.
CRIL is a research and technology center established in 1996 with the aim of improving the position of wood through the qualification of wood materials used in transport packaging. CRIL can boast important agreements at national level, especially with FederlegnoArredo/Assoimballaggi/Conlegno.
 
Recycling (data from Rilegno PSP 2018)
In 2017, based on data provided by Rilegno - the consortium that, within the CONAI system, deals with the recycling and recovery of wooden packaging - more than 60% of the packagings placed on the market for consumption was recovered, ie that packaging which, once used on Italian territory, constitutes waste within Italy. This classification also includes packaging of foreign production.
In 2017 wood packaging placed on the market amounted to 2,946 t/000 and, of this, over 1,793 t/000 was collected and recycled by Rilegno, with an increase of 10% compared to the previous year.

Barbara Iascone
Istituto Italiano Imballaggio