It should be mentioned that housing construction numbers for 2000 are expected to be in the range of normal investment demand for Germany. Significantly higher construction numbers in the mid-1990s were due to German unification. The paper and particleboard industries report shrinking input of industrial wood, because German recycling regulations for paper and packaging materials require a high input of old paper. The recycling quota is reported at 61 percent. However, reports from the industry indicate that demand for stationery items made from recycled paper is shrinking.
Customers prefer bright white high-quality paper.
Also the particleboard industry is increasingly re-utilizing uncontaminated used wood materials. The share of recycled wood in panel production is estimated at 20 percent. However, during the past ten years seven super-sized mills have been erected all over Germany, with milling capacity of more than 300,000 CUM annually. Another 12 companies mill more than 200,000 per year. All of these big mills apply the modern profiler technology.