Launch of a private fund to develop the timber industry in construction

Objective, to raise "40 million euros": "a first fundraising has already taken place, jointly financed by 24 regional banks of Crédit Agricole and Crédit Agricole SA", indicate Crédit Agricole and the "business angels" of Forinvest, private foresters, in a statement which AFP learned of on Wednesday.

"Today open to other institutional investors, this investment fund with an environmental and societal impact aims to support and assist companies throughout the value chain of the timber industry in their development by strengthening their funds clean, ”they add.

"We need industrial development, in first but especially second and third transformation", explained to AFP Eric Toppan, general secretary of Forinvest Business angels.

All the more so, according to him, that the new environmental regulations for new buildings, (RE2020), which must come into force on January 1, 2022, "aims to reduce the environmental footprint of buildings and thus gives a very strong dynamic to everything. which is construction based on wood products ".

Demand for engineered wood "is already greater than current production capacity," Toppan said.

"The last national wood construction survey, of 2018, showed that we were roughly 50% French wood in all wood-based construction," said Mr. Toppan.

However, this is an average and France is finding it much more difficult to meet the demand for more technical products, such as CLT, or cross-laminated timber, one of the essential elements for building high-rise buildings.

"Today, we are at 15% national production on the CLT. But we were at zero five years ago," said Mr. Toppan.

“Generally speaking, woods, to be used in construction, have to be dried. Once these woods are dried, they can go through further processing, and become engineered woods, whatever. will be used in glulam, ”Toppan recalled.

The capital raised by this new fund will notably make it possible to invest in dryers over the next four to five years.

The sector hopes to limit the use of imports of finished products from Austria, Germany or Northern Europe and thus improve the trade balance of the sector, which in recent years has shown a deficit of around 7 billion euros. euros.

"The Fund will take minority stakes in companies by investing amounts ranging from 0,5 to 5 million euros in growth, development or transmission capital projects", specify the initiators of the project.