MIRI: Integrated timber giant Samling Timber Group today signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Loggo IP Pty Ltd (LIP), an Australian developer of engineered wood products using planted wood species such as acacia and eucalyptus for building systems.
The buildings include houses, commercial and government complexes, three-storey walk-ups, shop-top houses as well as mid-rise and multi-residential apartments blocks.
The MoU was signed by Samling Group CEO Lawrence Chia and LIP founder and managing director Pat Thornton.
“We will work together on a pilot project in Sarawak using Loggo IP’s patented engineered wood technology focused on a burgeoning forest recovery industry to develop small diameter true rounds or peeler cores,” Chia said in a statement.
He said that every year millions of peeler cores are produced as waste from plywood production. These were largely used in low-value recovery options such as packaging and as fuel for thermal energy processes.
Thornton said: “As the world shortage of timber hits home, we are convinced Samling, long respected globally for its high standards of sustainable forest management, can develop these cost-competitive systems across Southeast Asia and beyond.
“However, in a world’s first, LIP has developed and patented three versatile engineered wood products as well as columns and each can be made from low-value forest thinning or peeler cores. Two of these beams can use Samling’s ply as a web. Apart from the financial benefits, Loggo’s low-tech, minimal processing and set-up costs and the economic advantage of these low-value plywood by-products is a green and sustainable way to increase returns.
“We embarked on a business plan whereby we would research, develop, and register a plethora of worldwide patents in secret. In 2015 we began applying this principle to peeler cores, with Malaysia in mind, having already recognised its ability to be the manufacturing hub throughout Asia with its already established paths to market with timber exports to China, India, Indonesia etc.”
The Asia-Pacific floor coverings market is estimated to exceed US$250 billion (RM1.18 trillion) by 2027.