Celebrating 70 years of manufacturing in PNG this year, PNG Forest Products has long been an industry leader in Engineered Wood Products in the South Pacific, Australasian and Southeast Asian regions.
Their extensive range of products and services for the domestic and export markets include pressure treated pine timber and plywood; kit homes and prefabricated buildings; modular bridges and bridge decking; and project construction & infrastructure development.
In fact, PNGFP is the largest supplier of timber housing & infrastructure projects in the South Pacific, having delivered more than 10,000 buildings. PNGFP supply PNG's only kit-set buildings engineered to PNG and Australian building codes, that are preservative pressure treated to fully protected from termites and rotting.
The construction division, NiuBuild, has built well over 2,000 buildings in PNG including numerous mining and exploration camps; over 1,000 school buildings; and supplied hundreds of education and health facilities throughout the country.
Innovation is at the core of the company’s success, as reflected by PNGFP’s Managing Director, Tony Honey: “We are producing and exporting some really innovative and interesting engineered wood products that are value adding to an otherwise basic piece of plywood."
“Modular bridges and decking into Australia and New Zealand; specialised railway bridge re-decking in Sydney; sound barriers along Australian highways and rail corridors; scarf-jointed bus and train floors for Australia, NZ, and Malaysia, and the list goes on.”
Surprisingly, the origins of the company start back in the early 1920’s, when Bulolo Gold Dredging (BGD) Limited was developing extensive alluvial mining operations in the Bulolo Valley.
To facilitate this large-scale operation, they needed sufficient housing in the valley for the hundreds of workers and their families. So BGD secured timber permits, established sawmill and joinery facilities, and set about building a town, complete with a school and hospital.
By the mid 1930s, a total of eight dredges scoured the valley floor, powered by BGD’s own hydro power stations. As the operation grew in scale, so did the town and the need for more timber.
In the 1940s the Forestry Department established a pine nursery and reforestation program, planting 60,000 young pine trees in December 1948 and each year thereafter. When the mining operation scaled down, BGD formed Commonwealth New Guinea Timbers Ltd and constructed the largest plywood factory in the Southern Hemisphere.
In 1954 plywood production and the export of products to overseas commenced, signalling the birth of a new industry.
Today, PNG Forest Products employs over 1,500 Papua New Guineans and is committed to building a better future through sustainable manufacturing practices. All timber is sourced from renewable pine plantations managed by the PNG Forest Services. Sawdust and wood chip waste from the mills are utilised to power the boilers for the veneer driers and kilns.
PNGFP also works in conjunction with the Department of Environment and Conservation to ensure that the best environmental practices are maintained. In fact, PNG Forest Products is the only company in PNG that has achieved PEFC Chain of Custody accreditation based on 100% controlled wood.
PEFC (the Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification) is an international organisation that promotes sustainable forest management through independent third-party certification. PNGFP’s Chain of Custody certification demonstrates a commitment to sustainable forest management that is unique in this country.
As a further commitment to sustainability, the company’s manufacturing facilities in Bulolo are powered by their own hydropower stations, which they continue to invest in heavily.
In 2023, PNGFP Hydro commissioned their fourth power station at Baime, feeding 11.6MW into PPL’s Ramu grid and raising their capacity to supply PPL up to a total of 21MW. The combination of renewable timber resources processed with sustainable hydro power makes PNGFP’s engineered wood products truly and uniquely 100% green.
For 70 years PNGFP has shown a great propensity to evolve and grow through innovation and diversification. From plywood to Engineered Wood Products, to Independent Power Production… and there’s more.
In Bulolo, PNGP operates a supermarket, bakery, butchery, liquor store, hardware store, service station, country club, abattoir, poultry farm and a 600-hectare cattle farm, all servicing the town and surrounding districts.
“Our future lies in adding value to our resources, whether it be timber, land or water,” says MD Tony Honey.
“Improved recovery from our log supply is essential, as is developing new products for our Pacific Region. Continuing our diversity through power generation, forest products, and poultry and cattle operations develops employment and sustainable income. Continuing reinvestment in our business is the key to our continued viability and the core to our future success.”
