The German sawmill industry closes the first half of 2016 with a general positive assessment, so it can show a largely positive interim balance at mid-year. The businesses were started with cautious optimism in 2016, according to a weak 2015 domestic production and strong decline in exports, which has little chances of radical improvement in 2016.

The data for the first half 2016 shows that the situation of the German sawmills is gradually improving. The German softwood lumber production increased slightly in the first three months by 3.0% again. In the second quarter, the slight improvement continued further and the production index grew by 2.9% is in the first 5 months on a yearly basis. In May alone, the production increased by 9.5%. Thus, the 1.6% decrease from 2015 could be compensated.