The United States exports nearly $10 billion in forest and wood products each year. These exports help sustain employment in the U.S. forest products industry—nearly 950,000 jobs—and reinforce the economic value of keeping America’s forests healthy, productive, and sustainably managed.
Healthy markets for U.S. wood products create incentives to manage forests responsibly, keep forestland intact, and support rural communities that depend on forestry. A strong export industry ensures that sustainable forest management remains both environmentally sound and economically viable, linking American innovation and stewardship to global demand for quality, renewable materials.
IPT strengthens the connection between U.S. wood producers and global markets by helping American companies expand their reach, share technical expertise, and engage in international policy discussions that shape the future of the forest sector.
The implementation of the European Union Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) is expected to broadly impact wood products companies that sell to Europe and other economies connected through the global supply chain. In 2023, American forest products exports to the EU were valued at over $4.5 billion1, a portfolio that could be threatened by unprecedented compliance requirements.
What is the EUDR:
Objective: Prevent deforestation-linked products from entering the EU market.
Applies To: Cattle, cocoa, coffee, palm oil, soy, timber, rubber & derived products.
Effective Date: December 30, 2025 for large companies and June 30, 2026 for small businesses.
Requirement: Companies must conduct due diligence on their supply chains, including collecting geolocation data of the land where the commodities were produced, to ensure products do not come from deforested land after Dec 31, 2020 and comply with local laws.
Impact: Aims to promote sustainable trade but has sparked trade concerns globally.
How USFS IPT and the Foundation can help:
Though the European Union has selected a definition for “deforestation”, the process for determining areas that qualify as “degraded” remains unclear. Many American and international stakeholders have expressed concerns that sustainable forestry practices could be misrepresented as “degradation”, which would jeopardize American exports and undermine the United States’ position in promoting healthy forests.Drawing on the agency’s expertise in forest monitoring, IPT has provided rebuttals to the European Union Forest Observatory that tracks deforestation and forest degradation. This technical exchange aims to harmonize EU depictions of forest change with U.S. standards on data interpretation and classification. In other words, IPT is ensuring that American forestry is accurately portrayed in the EU geospatial platforms.
Traceability and geolocation are a central and concerning component of EUDR. Wood exports need to include extremely specific information regarding the geographic origin of the wood products down to a “plot of land,” a specific real estate property. These requirements are necessitating innovations in the science-based testing of wood products to determine the forest stands of origin with unprecedented precision.To satisfy these requirements and maintain American economic competitiveness, IPT and U.S. university partners are collaborating with U.S. forest landowners and sawmills to develop new tools and technologies that validate the location of harvest through wood chemistry analyses. Based on initial sampling and testing of hardwood and softwood timber, these tools can verify the source of the wood products to within six miles in certain geographies.The development of this technology can potentially transform an American compliance challenge to a comparative advantage in the European markets, as other countries could not compete with this robust database and methodology to prove wood origin.
Unlike other agricultural commodities, U.S. forest product exports are not represented by a single trade association. To ensure the participation of the entire American forest products value chain, IPT convenes forest landowners, manufacturers, and other stakeholders to consolidate positions and priorities on international trade issues. In June 2025, IPT hosted a workshop discussion to assess the current status of the EUDR, priority concerns of American forest industry, and opportunities for coordination between private sector and the U.S. government on engagement with the EU. Participants included industry (National Alliance of Forest Owners, American Forest and Paper Association, American Wood Council, Hardwood Federation, U.S. Industrial Pellets Association) and interagency (Department of Commerce, U.S. Office of US Trade Representative, USDA Foreign Agricultural Service) representatives.
The EUDR is affecting wood product commerce globally, not just the European trade customers. Wood processing companies in Asia, Latin America, and elsewhere are wary of sourcing wood material that could disqualify their products from penetrating the EU. To counter any misperceptions and to convey the values of U.S. forest management, IPT is supporting wood export associations in the development of emerging markets and maintaining presence in mature markets during a time of turmoil.IPT is working with the Softwood Export Council, Engineered Wood Association, and the Southern Forest Products Association on market development programs in Vietnam, Peru, Dominican Republic, and other countries with wood processing operations for European export. With the trade associations, IPT provides technical assistance and delivers educational services regarding the sustainability of U.S. forest management and the availability of high-quality data on American wood products. These educational activities provide some assurance to foreign industry stakeholders who are unnerved by the developments of EUDR and export market access constraints.