HCM City (VNA) - Vietnam will soon issue quality and technical regulations for wood glues to better controlthis input material for the wood processing industry, according to the Ministryof Agriculture and Rural Development.

The move also targets to protect the health ofwood product producers and users as well as to raise the quality and prestigeof Vietnamese wood products in the market, said Nguyen ManhDung of the ministry’sDepartment of Processing and Trade for Agro-Forestry-Fisheries Products andSalt Production.

With timber resources from natural forestsshrinking, wood exploited from plantation forests has become a main source for Vietnam’s woodprocessing industry.

According to the zoning plan for the woodprocessing industry, the country targets to produce three million cubic metresof artificial board a year by 2020, of which fibre board accounts for 1.6-1.8million m3, joined timber slabs about one million m3 and particle board between100,000-320,000 m3.

The demand for different wood adhesives,including UF (urea-formaldehyde), PF (phenol-formaldehyde), MF(melamine-formaldehyde) and PVAc (polyvinyl acetate), is expected to reach240,000-300,000 tonnes a year by 2020, Dungtold a seminar on technical standards for wood glue quality held on thesidelines of the Vietnam InternationalFurniture and Home Accessories Fair (VIFA-EXPO 2017).

Before 2010, producers of wood adhesives,particularly UF and PF, did not pay much attention in the quality of theirproducts.

This was changed since 2011 when manybusinesses, especially foreign firms, began supplying the market manyhigh-quality wood glues.

But many wood processors, particularly thoseproducing MDF (Medium-density fibre board) and particle board, stillproduce the adhesives to serve their own demand, and many businesses importedpoor quality adhesives for the domestic market.

In fact, many wood processors still use lowquality adhesives to reduce their production costs, with their products mainlysold in the domestic market.
The quality of wood adhesives has great affectedto the wood product quality as well as the health of producers and users.

Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) with highvapor pressure at ordinary room temperature are included in wood glues such asformaldehyde and have adverse effects on humans and the environment.

This requires the country to quickly establishstandards and technical regulations to manage and control the quality of woodglues, he said.

The department, in collaboration withuniversities and institutes as well as based on Singapore’s standardregulations, have compiled a draft on national technical regulation on thequality of wood adhesives.

The department is collecting comments fromleading experts in the industry and relevant organizations to amend, adjust andcomplete the draft, he said.

Vietnam was among the world’s large producers andexporters of wooden products.

According to the Handicraft and WoodIndustry Association of HCM City, the export of wood and wood products isexpected to fetch 8 billion USD thisyear, up from 7.3 billion USD last year.

In the domestic market, consumption of woodproducts is forecast to be about 1.3 billion USD this year, said HuynhVan Hanh,the association’s deputy chairman.-VNA