Laminated timber imports down by 23% in three months

Article by Martina Nöstler (translated by Eva Guzely) | 28.04.2025 - 10:25

In the first three months of 2025, Japan imported more glulam and CLT from Finland, Russia and China. Meanwhile, smaller volumes were purchased from Austria, Estonia and Romania. On balance, laminated timber imports decreased substantially.

From January to March, Japan reduced its glulam and CLT imports by 23% year on year to 110,000 m³. It was the smallest import volume in many years, as a look in the Datacube shows. The first quarter of 2010, was the last time an even smaller volume (108,000 m³) was imported. In the first three months of 2022, the total import volume was twice as big (268,000 m³).

Imports from Finland were down by 48% year on year and thus nearly halved to a total of only 35,000 m³. Decreases were also recorded in shipments from Russia (7,100 m³; -33%) or Germany (6,000 m³; -6%).

In the first quarter, Japan increased its purchases from Austria by 24% to around 18,000 m³. More laminated timber was also imported from Estonia (13,300 m³; +26%), Romania (11,700 m³; +7%) and Poland (9,500 m³; +40%), as figures published by Statistics of Japan show.