New global wood chip price indices launched

Oct. 22,
2010 – More than 80 million tons of wood chips, valued at almost USD $10
billion, are traded annually in the open market worldwide, and shipment volumes
are increasing. The vast majority of traded wood chips are currently used for
pulp production, but the volumes used to generate energy are growing. The key
participants in this trade, including forest companies, energy producers,
trading houses, and financial institutions, have requested that FOEX Indexes
Ltd. considers including wood chip prices in the company’s portfolio of pulp,
paper, and pellet indices (PIX).

Wood Resources International LLC (WRI) has been collecting and publishing prices of
sawlogs, pulpwood, and wood chips since 1988. FOEX and WRI have agreed to
partner in the launching of global wood chip price indices. As for all price
benchmarks in FOEX's PIX-index family, the indices will be based on a large
number of actual trades, and the data will be collected from both sellers and
buyers of wood chips. Initially, the price indices will be published separately
for pulp and energy end uses. Detailed index specifications will be published
after discussions with the interested parties have been concluded. The launch
is planned for early 2011.

To learn more about this new service, contact: Matti Sihvonen, matti.sihvonen@foex.fi,
FOEX representative in bio-indices; Timo Teräs, timo@foex.fi, managing
director; or Håkan Ekström, hekstrom@wri-ltd.com, WRI president.