Lesy CR’s Revenues Down 20% Due To Decline In Lumber Prices

Hradec Kralove, East Bohemia, Aug 26 (CTK) – Lesy CR (LCR) state-run forest management company saw its sales revenues fall annually by 20 percent to Kc4.68bn at the end of June, which was connected with a dramatic drop of wood prices on the Central European Market, LCR head of marketing and communication Ondrej Kopecky told CTK.

 

LCR’s gross profit decreased annually by 38 percent to Kc1.77bn in the first half of this year, which was due to a fall in prices of wood flooding the market because of the bark beetle and natural calamities, LCR said.

 

The decrease was also impacted by an 11 percent rise in personnel costs reaching Kc1bn.

 

LCR owns nearly a half of the Czech Republic’s forests.

 

LCR’s logging volume went up by 22 percent to 4.77 million cubic metres in H1 because of calamity wood processing.

 

As of September 1, Josef Vojacek, who has been the head of Vojenske lesy a statky (VLS) forestry company, will be the head of LCR. He will replace Daniel Szorad who was dismissed by former agriculture minister Jiri Milek in mid-May for not handling the bark beetle calamity.

 

Every year, LCR calls five-year tenders covering forestry work on about a fifth of its area. It gets most of the logging work and timber sales done by private companies winning the tenders, with its main business partners being Uniles group, Kloboucka lesni, Stora Enso Wood Products Zdirec, Jihozapadni drevarska, and Lesni spolecnost Ledec nad Sazavou.

 

Last year’s net profit of LCR fell by 26 percent to Kc3.08bn, the lowest figure in seven years, which was due to lower timber sales and bigger provisioning, LCR said.

 

LCR business results in 2010-2018:

 

2010

2011

2012

2013

2014

2015

2016

2017

as of June 30, 2018

after-tax profit (Kc bn)

2.558

4.225

4.408

3.99

6.818

5.395

4.159

3.084

pre-tax profit (Kc bn)

3.160

5.275

5.478

4.957

7.963

6.494

4.984

3.744

1.77

revenues from sales of own products and services (Kc bn)

9.77

11.8

11.6

11.5

12.1

11.8

10.9

10.2

4.682

timber logging (mil. of cubic metres)

8.05

8.02

7.84

8.04

7.98

7.70

8.10

8.05

4.77

Source: Lesy CR