Regional shifts of employment growth in the European wood-based panel and furniture industries

Abstract

Wood-based panels, produced from primary processing of raw timber, are a major input for furniture. Both industries form an important production chain in Europe's forest-based sector and face on-going structural changes induced mainly by technological innovation, expansion and relocation in the context of a growing global competition. In an exploratory shift-share analysis, the study investigates these changes and their effects on employment in the two interconnected industries across the European countries from 1999 to 2007. The results reveal opposite growth trends in Western and Eastern countries, as well as dynamic restructuring processes especially in the Eastern industries. Western countries lose employees on a large scale for the sake of new emerging jobs in Eastern countries, however on a smaller scale. The major shifts are induced by widespread outsourcing, relocation and downsizing trends and it can be shown that the regional availability of skilled, low cost labour and raw wood material represent the key locational factors in the wood-based panel and furniture industries. The study highlights regions where wood-based panel and furniture industries in neighbouring Western and Eastern countries clearly interact. The findings of cross-regional employment shifts can help to inform regional policies for sustainable development of Europe's forest-based sector from a macroeconomic and social perspective.Délocalisations régionales de l'emploi dans les industries de panneau en bois et d'ameublement européens. T. OSSES, U. KIES et A. SCHULTELe panneau en bois, fabriqué dans la première transformation du bois brut, représente un produit de base important pour l'ameublement. Les deux industries constituent une chaine de production importante dans la filière forêt-bois en Europe et sont confrontées avec un changement des structures majeur entrainée par l'innovation technologique, expansion et délocalisation dans un contexte de compétition mondiale en croissance. A travers d'une analyse 'shift-share' de ce pair d'industries dans le pays européens pendant la période de 1999 à 2007, l'étude examine ces changements et leurs effets sur l'emploi. Les résultats montrent des tendances de croissance opposées dans les pays d'ouest et d'est, et aussi un processus de restructuration dynamique en particulier dans les pays d'est. Les pays d'ouest perdent de l'emploi à grande échelle pendant que de nouvel emploi émerge dans les pays d'est, mais à une échelle moins importante. Les plus grandes délocalisations sont déclenchées par des tendances répandues en externalisation, déplacements des usines et dégraissage des effectifs. Les résultats démontrent que la disponibilité de la main-d'oeuvre qualifiée à bas prix et de la matière première en bois représentent les facteurs clé de localisation dans les industries de panneau en bois et d'ameublement. L'étude fait ressortir des régions où les deux industries interagissent entre des pays voisins d'ouest et d'est. Ces résultats concernant les délocalisations interrégionales de l'emploi pe...

Evaluating the International Competitiveness of Vietnam Wood Processing Industry by Combining the Variation Coefficient and the Entropy Method

“…Austrian wood companies, one of the European leading innovation investments, outsourced Eastern Europe with more skill intensive manufacturing phases. In these nations, this has improved productivity [41][42][43]. In addition, Austria is the largest foreign direct investor in Eastern Europe'wood sector [44][45][46].…”

“…The Austrian wood panel sector is highly oriented toward export, which accounted for 87% of the total production in 2007. In furniture products, Sweden and Finland had comparative advantages, particularly, extensive technology use, high levels of technical competence, automation, and design [43,47]. In contrast, due to lower than average export performance, Canada, the US, Finland and France lost market shares (Figure 4c).…”

“…Due to this phase, however, and further impacted by company mergers and relocation, the German furniture industry lost over 25% of its staff over less than a decade. The amount of new employment in Eastern Europe has not counterbalanced these losses [43,44].…”

“…The decline of jobs in the US wood processing sector was also associated with increased imports of semi-finished and finished furniture from low-cost nations such as China, Vietnam, or other Southeast Asian countries. This resulted in demands of anti-dumping requirements in the US and the EU [43,49]. The fact that wood products are a non-essential item and can be postponed in purchasing suggests that sales of wood products will be the first to be impacted during an economic downturn [50].…”

Effect of layups on the mechanical properties of overlaid laminated bamboo lumber made of radial bamboo slices

“…Moreover, the bamboo processing businesses are mainly distributed in Asia and some Latin American countries based on labor intensive, which has brought great opportunities for the bamboo industrial development and employment in the local area [14]. Due to the low degree of automation in the production of traditional bamboo-based units (such as bamboo curtain and bamboo mat), some procedures rely on manual operation, which results in higher demand for labor [15,16].However, the bamboo-working industries are facing tremendous burden due to the unceasing promotion of our country resident per capita national income.…”