What do European timber price indices track?

Different things under the same name. Each national series tracks the average price of roundwood for one kind of sale: standing timber sold before harvest, logs sold at the roadside, or wood delivered by the owner. Some cover private sellers, some only public land. Some measure volume under bark, others over bark. Some report nominal prices, others strip out inflation with different deflators. Some adjust for the size of timber sold, and at least one prices volumes from companies' price lists rather than recording each deal. Harmonised indices exist that put several countries on one basis, at the cost of conversions of their own. Read on their own terms, the national series are reliable official statistics. Compared with each other without checking, they mislead.

What the usual answer says

Descriptions say the indices track roundwood prices, such as sawlogs and pulpwood, across European markets. Many searchers mean sawn timber, which commercial price reporters cover. Both answers imply a common measure. For the official roundwood series, there isn't one.

Three official series

One national forest agency's roundwood price statistics cover the first sale from forest owner to buyer. They include "only prices of delivery timber", which the agency says "represent less than 10 percent of total volume". Volumes are measured at the mill, in solid cubic metres under bark. The price comes from a measurement body that "calculates a price for the quantity of roundwood measured using pricelists reported by the companies", so the series reflects price lists applied to measured volume, not negotiated deals. Prices are "current prices, which do not take inflation into account".

A national research institute publishes monthly volumes and prices from trade agreements supplied by the largest buyers and forest management associations, representing "about 90 per cent" of wood bought from non-industrial private forests. Its commentary gives changes "in real terms by eliminating the change in value using the cost-of-living index". In June 2026, standing sale prices for pulpwood rose about 5% on the month in euro terms. In real terms, standing pulpwood was 22% to 24% below the 2025 average.

A national forestry research agency's timber price indices, published twice a year, cover only timber sold by public forest bodies, with volume over bark. The standing sales index "is adjusted for timber size mix using the Fisher method with five-yearly chain-linking", and real terms use the GDP deflator. The release is candid: "Standing timber, sawlogs, and small roundwood are distinct markets and may show different price movements". Its release of 28 May 2026 had the standing sales index 11.7% higher in real terms in the year to March 2026, and the softwood sawlog index 31% lower in real terms in the six months to March 2026. Those are different products over different periods from one publisher. The differences between countries are in method, which the table below sets out.

Harmonised indices

Some indices put several countries on one basis. A commercial pan-European sawlog index, running since 1999, gives volume-weighted average prices for the nine largest log-consuming countries in Europe. The pallet industry's European federation compiles five national pallet timber indices, noting "These are not the absolute prices per m3". Instead it takes "comparable pallet wood sizes" and gives them "the same base year". Harmonising means converting currencies, mapping each country's assortments to common ones, and choosing weights. The national series are free, official, longer-running and open about method; the harmonised ones are comparable across borders and less transparent, and the commercial ones are paid. Which to use depends on the question. A buyer comparing log costs across borders needs the common basis. A seller judging a domestic sale needs its own country's series, read on its own terms.

Before comparing

Only series that match on all of these can be compared by level. Others can be compared by direction, with care. A business trading in more than one country can record each series with these attributes attached, and AI can read each release, extract figures with their definitions and flag when a method note changes.

When it doesn't apply

Businesses that sell only under long fixed contracts need these series only for context. And no index says what a particular stand or parcel will fetch.

Quarri for forest management is built around how a forest operation runs, from the cruise to the settled account.

Quarri is an AI-native data platform for the timber supply chain. It connects buying, production, sales and inventory for forest management, sawmill, wood products and pulp, paper and packaging operators.