RISI Announces New Leadership for Lumber, Wood Panels and Timber Forecasting Services

BOSTON -

Release Highlights: - Bob Berg returns to head up Lumber Practice - Bernard Fuller to assume lead of Wood Panels Practice - Peter Barynin rejoins to run Timber Practice

RISI, the leading information provider for the global forest products industry, today announced the return of two of its founders, Bob Berg and Bernard Fuller to head up RISI’s North American Lumber and North American Wood Panels Forecasting Services respectively. In addition, former RISI Director Peter Barynin returns to take the lead on RISI’s North American Timber Forecasting Service.

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Bob Berg returns to RISI, after having left in 2007 to pursue other wood market opportunities. Bob has spent over 25 years following the North American solid wood markets, specializing in price forecasting. Bob is a founding member of RISI and built many of its solid wood and engineered lumber models along with segments of the timber and panel models. During his tenure from 1985 to 2007, Bob mentored many of the economists following the North American lumber markets.

Bernard Fuller, also a founding member of RISI, specializes in the end-use markets for wood products (wood-based panels and lumber). Over the past quarter century, Bernard has led analysis on the panelboard (softwood plywood, oriented strandboard, medium density fibreboard and particleboard) and treated wood products markets. Bernard has been with RISI from 1985 to present, most recently contributing to RISI’s monthly and quarterly forecasts for panel, engineered wood products and lumber markets and will now return to the role full time.

Peter Barynin rejoins RISI, where he previously held the title of Director of the North American Timber Forecasting Service, with over 15 years of experience as a forest industry economist. Most recently, Peter was founder and Chief Economist for Resource Vision Inc., which conducts research and analysis on global wood fiber issues and the intricacies of the timber markets.

These appointments add to the existing strong team of economists, editors and analysts covering wood, timber and biomass at RISI. The team includes Bob Flynn, Director of International Timber Analysis, Chris Lyddan, Executive Editor Timber and Woodfiber, William Perritt, Editor Wood Biomass Market Report, and Ken Tennefoss and the Crow’s team looking at the lumber markets.

Mike Coffey, RISI’s CEO commented, “I’m very happy to have Bob, Bernie and Peter re-joining us. The transition to this team has been absolutely seamless, ensuring a consistent view for our customers. Together they bring unique perspectives and broad experiences which coupled with RISI’s unparallel depth of historical data and economic modeling will allow us to continue to provide an important practical set of contributions to our clients — something others cannot provide.” Coffey continued, “The wood products and even timber industries have gone through tremendous change these past few years and we need to offer quality information and services to our customers who are under more pressure than ever. The addition of Bob, Bernie and Peter to our stable of industry leading economists ensures RISI is in a position to meet this challenge.”

Berg, Fuller and Barynin will all be attending and presenting the following topics at RISI’s 24th North American Forest Products Conference on September 14-16 in San Diego:

- Bob Berg - the North American End-Use Markets & and the North American Lumber Outlook; - Bernard Fuller - the North American Structural Panel Outlook, the North American Non-Structural Panel Outlook and the North American Engineered Wood Products Outlook; - Peter Barynin - the North American Timber Outlook

Berg, Fuller and Barynin will be working out of RISI’s Bedford, MA office and can be reached as follows:

- Bob Berg +1-781-734-8914 or via e-mail at bberg@risi.com - Bernard Fuller +1-781-734-8913 or via e-mail at bfuller@risi.com - Peter Barynin +1-781-734-8912 or via e-mail at pbarynin@risi.com

About RISI

RISI is the leading information provider for the global forest products industry. The company works with clients in the pulp and paper, wood products, wood biomass, tissue, timber, non-wovens, printing and publishing and financial services industries to help them make better decisions.

Headquartered in Boston (Bedford), Massachusetts, RISI operates offices in Brussels, Belgium; Atlanta, Georgia; San Francisco, California; Portland, Oregon; Sao Paulo, Brazil; Shanghai, China; Singapore; Helsinki, Finland; and Charlottesville, Virginia.

More information can be found at www.risi.com. Press Contact Dan Blenk, RISI Marketing Director 4 Alfred Circle Bedford, MA 01730 Tel: +1-781-734-8942 dblenk@risi.com

Source: RISI

Dan Blenk, RISI Marketing Director, +1-781-734-8942, dblenk at risi.com / Logo: https://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20080521/NEW122LOGO