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It is estimated that a total of 12.2 million green tonnes of roundwood was removed from UK woodlands in 2018.  

Softwood accounted for most (93%) removals from UK woodland and totalled 11.4 million green tonnes in 2018 (Table 2.1).  This represented a 4% increase on the previous year’s figure.  

Hardwood removals totalled 0.8 million green tonnes in 2018. 

Private sector woodlands accounted for 60% of softwood production and 90% of hardwood production in 2018.

Table 2.1 Wood production, 2009-2018

Year Softwood   Hardwood  
  FE/FLS/NRW/FS1 woodland Private sector2 woodland  Total softwood FE/FLS/NRW/FS1 woodland Private sector2 woodland Total hardwood3,4
thousand green tonnes      
2009 5126 3266 8392 87 449 536
2010 4625 4633 9258 70 465 535
2011 4870 5186 10056 75 465 541
2012 4836 5259 10095 55 479 534
2013 5084 5852 10936 78 454 532
2014 4900 6627 11527 71 466 537
2015 4691 5968 10659 73 493 566
2016 5011 5734 10745 68 529 597
2017 4862 6075 10938 83 655 738
2018 4523 6827 11351 86 747 834

Source: Forestry England, Forestry and Land Scotland, Natural Resources Wales, Forest Service, industry surveys, industry associations.

Notes:

1. FE: Forestry England, FLS: Forestry and Land Scotland, NRW: Natural Resources Wales, FS: Forest Service (Northern Ireland).

2. Private sector: removals from all other woodland (including some publicly owned woodland).

3. Most hardwood production in the UK comes from private sector woodland; the figures are estimates based on reported deliveries to wood processing industries and others.

4. The increase in hardwood removals between 2016 and 2017 is largely attributed to a revised estimate for deliveries of UK grown hardwood used for woodfuel (see Table 2.6). This new estimate should not be interpreted as an increase in a single year.

Longer time series of the above table, including estimates by country (England/ Wales/ Scotland/ Northern Ireland) are available from the Data downloads web page at: www.forestresearch.gov.uk/tools-and-resources/statistics/data-downloads/.

Additional resources

Sources chapter: Wood production

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