The paper manufacturer will increase speciality product prices by 8% as of 1 November. The price rise includes all its markets and follows a continued strong demand for the range.  

Sappi Trading Australasia managing director Tim Schafer told ProPrint that while “we don’t necessarily implement global pricing rigidly”, he could not confirm or deny that the price rise would be passed on to the local market.

“There is upward pressure on pricing, and we need to protect our margins,” he said. “There’s also a lot riding on currency at the moment.”

Gregory Gettinger, director specialities at Sappi Fine Paper Europe, said: “Our first price rise has barely compensated for the extraordinary cost increases.

“The upwards trend of cost increases in oil-related additives, starches and wood, is having a serious effect on our margins and makes our latest price increase unavoidable.”

He added that “2011 seems to be starting like 2010”, but said the company doesn’t know what the economy is really doing in 2011 and can’t predict how costs will develop.

“Therefore we can’t forecast on the price front either,” he said.

In June, Sappi Fine Paper Europe also announced it was to increase the cost of its flexible packaging, label, and release liner papers and boards by 6% as of 1 July in all European and overseas markets.

In April, Sappi raised the price of its coated fine papers by “at least 10%” and said it would stagger increases for its mechanical coated papers across the rest of the year.

The company has previously said it has been hit by “the extraordinary increase” in pulp costs due to “the severe pulp shortage resulting from the earthquake in Chile“.

Australian paper merchants told ProPrint in April that industrial action at several European pulp mills had exacerbated recent price rises.

Read the original article at www.printweek.com.

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