Timber iQ August - September 2020 // Issue: 50 August - September 2020 | Page 29

WOOD WISE
South Africa has a population growth of approximately 1.3%,
but it is slowing, so we can expect that within 40 years, our
population will start to decline. It is difficult to determine how
many houses will be constructed in the next few decades, but
for our calculations we worked on an average over this time,
estimated an average requirement of 54 000 houses annually.
GLOBAL TRENDS
Considering building trends in other parts of the world using
timber (see Diagram 3) you will see that between 1992 and
2017, South Africa’s wooden structure market share was
basically 0. It is interesting to note that in Germany in 1992,
there was a 6% wood-building market share and in 2017 this
rose to 18%. In England it was also around the 6% mark and
now it holds almost 30% market share. America has remained
consistent over the period and wood-building accounts for just
over 90% of market share.
Diagram 3.
In reality, what we expect being possible in South Africa is easily
a 30% wood-building market share. Once again considering
global warming potential (GWP) we compared different scenarios
(see Diagram 4). If we could achieve a 10% wood-building
market share for residential buildings the result would be up to a
6.5% saving on GWP, a 100% wood-building scenario could
achieve up to a 71% saving on GWP. Now if you think how
important buildings are in terms of global warming, these are
serious and very positive numbers.
Diagram 4.
Part 2 of this article will be published in the following issue of
Timber IQ.
// AUGUST / SEPTEMBER 2020 27