While Buchanan buys hardwood logs and timber on the open market, one unique aspect of our operation is that we own and/or manage over 100,000 acres of timberland throughout the South.

We are a leader in the conservation movement. Members of our staff have served as past chairmen of the Alabama Forestry Commission that prescribes Alabama's Best Management Practices for Forestry.

In fact, we typically plant between 500,000 and 2 million seedlings each year. That is good news for the future.

Forest Statistics

North America's forests are abundant and growing. Between them, Canada and the United States contain 15 percent (10 percent in Canada and 5 percent in the U.S.) of the Earth's forest cover. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization's (FAO) State of the World's Forests 2001 reports that North American forest cover expanded nearly 10 million acres (4 million hectares) over the last decade.

Today, the volume of wood in U.S. forests is about 25 percent greater than it was 40 years ago.¹

Each year, there are 1.5 billion tree seedlings planted in the United States. That is more than five new trees for each American and nearly 2,000 for every bear. Forest planting in the United States currently averages about 2.4 million acres per year.¹

Nationally, annual forest growth has continually exceeded harvest since the 1940s. By 1992, forest growth exceeded harvest by 34 percent and the volume of timber in the forest was 360 percent greater than it had been in 1920.¹

¹ Source: ForestInformation.com