It’s now an incredible 73 years ago that the name of Berneck began operating in the forest products industry.
At first, in 1952 the focus was on solid hardwoods, like many in the Brazil wood industries, but its diversification over the decades saw it develop into veneers, plywood, plantation timber and finally composite wood panels.
Today, the business is focused on panels and plantation pine lumber. In the case of the former, Berneck SA Paineis e Serrados is now the second largest panels producer by volume in Brazil.
The third-generation family business is led by president Daniel Berneck, who has now worked with the company for 25 years. He told WBPI about its recent investments – particularly at the Curitibanos site – and his opinions of the Brazil and wider South America market situation.
DEVELOPMENT OF PANEL PRODUCTION
It was production of veneers (first sliced, then rotary cut) that led into panel production – first plywood in the 1970s, then particleboard (PB) in the 1990s.
President Daniel Berneck told WBPI that the company ceased plywood production in the mid-to-late 1980s, due in part to raw material sourcing difficulties. Its solid hardwood sawmill operations continued until 2004, when it stopped mainly due to difficulties sourcing the material and because legislative/environmental changes made it difficult for industrial sized operations to continue working with hardwoods. Now the hardwood sector is concentrated on smaller, specialist operators.
MDF was added to the product mix in 2008. Its panel products today are focused on PB (medium density PB), MDF and HDF, using mainly plantation pine raw material.
Araucária in the southern state of Parana is the head office and features production lines for PB, MDF and HDF, as well as melamine facing operations and a sawmill.
The first PB line started with a small Siempelkamp multi-opening (MO) line with 5,000m3 per month production capacity. This was followed by an upgrade to a larger used MO line with a 1,000m3 day capacity.
Berneck’s relationship with Siempelkamp extended in 2000 when a first continuous line (2200mm x 42.1m) was bought to replace the MO PB line at Araucária. In 2008 a second continuous line was built to produce MDF there, with further investment to modernise the pine sawmill.
In 2012, Berneck extended operations to a further site at Curitibanos in the state of Santa Catarina – a greenfield complex – with an MDF line and a sawmill.
WBPI visited the 250ha site in 2011 during the installation of the MDF line. It sits eight miles from the town of Curitibanos and is surrounded by forest plantations.
In 2016, a 2750mm-wide continuous Siempelkamp ContiRoll PB line started at this site. Melamine facing operations also run at Curitibanos.
A third site at Lages, Santa Catarina was added in 2023 – comprising an MDF mill with 550,000m3 annual capacity and a sawmill. The Siempelkamp ContiRoll Generation 9 NEO MDF line has a length of 48.8m.
The Lages project also involved Siempelkamp group companies Büttner (drying) and Sicoplan (engineering). Andritz supplied a pressurised refining and evaporation system.
“We only have Siempelkamp press lines up to this moment,” said Mr Berneck.
“Investment in the Curitibanos site is ongoing, with our project to double our PB capacity there. We’re working on the civil construction with the foundations for a new dryer installation.”
The drum dryer was purchased from Dieffenbacher and is one of the largest of its kind in the world. An 84MW energy system was also purchased from Dieffenbacher.
The grate of the energy system has a size of 106m² and the drum of the dryer is 36m long and has a diameter of 7.8m. At 155% material moisture, the dryer will achieve a throughput of 43t/hr. The partnership with Dieffenbacher also involved Inserco.
The current PB capacity at Curitibanos is 1,300m3 daily (approximately 450,000m3 annually), rising to about 2,500m3 (approx 825,000m3 annually) when the project is finished in the first half of 2026.
“There are no changes to the press itself,” added Mr Berneck. “Last year we did an upgrade, with a packaging line purchased from Anthon to improve the packaging capabilities. We now have three packaging lines after the two sanding lines to absorb all of the new production of PB.”
The current and last phase of investment at the Curitibanos PB mill is the chip preparation area, with a technology package from the IMALPAL Group on both the green and dry sides of the production process.
Conveyors are being supplied from Trasmec.
IMALPAL Group supplied 4 extractors and 4 silos, 2 bunker scales, 3 oscillating screens for 32 sqm each, 4 knife flakers for wet material and 2 knife flakers for dry material, a fully automatic sharpening room, 2 air sifters and 1 roll screen.
The blending area was upgraded to support the new capacity.
The scope of supply includes metal structures, extraction systems, conveyors, cabling, electrical and software components.
So, to summarise, Berneck has five panel production lines in operation – all now running 2750mm wide Siempelkamp continuous presses – with the PB line at Araucária being 2200mm wide.
Mr Berneck estimated current Group production capacity at approximately 7,000m3 per day, or 2,415,000m3 per year. The increase at the Curitibanos PB plant will further increase this to 8,200m3 per day or 2,830,000m3 per year.
This increase at Curitibanos further consolidates Berneck’s position as the second largest panel producer in Brazil (after Duratex).
EXPORTS AND CURRENT ECONOMIC DYNAMICS
Berneck today exports its products to up to 60 countries around the world. Its sawn lumber has a 25-35% export rate, while panel products exports are about 20% of output.
South America is one of the largest export targets for raw and finished panel products – with Bolivia and Argentina among the customer markets.
“But we do sell abroad, including in Asia, Mexico, the US, and even Europe these days,” said Mr Berneck.
“The volumes to Europe are considerable – 4,000 – 5,000m3 per month, to countries such as Portugal, Spain, Poland and even Germany. Freight rates are the most determining factor. Europe is not a place we imagined we would be selling but it was an opportunity and the freight rates are aligned.”
Mr Berneck said the price of electrical energy, the Ukraine war, and availability of raw materials in Europe were additional reasons for being competitive.
Looking at the Brazilian economy itself, Mr Berneck said volatile conditions meant only very short-term forecasting was possible.
“We are not currently able to project any further than a month ahead with any kind of accuracy. Here in Brazil, we’re very well trained to live with uncertainty, so we are very flexible and nimble in that sense.
“This year we expect to reach about 15.5% interest rates, the highest level in about 20 years. We are currently at about 14%.”
Mr Berneck’s said the current Brazilian administration’s ‘Big Government’ philosophy was not the ideal solution for industry development and believes potential stagflation conditions were building in Brazil.
What he calls the government’s uncoordinated way of dealing with the economy was likely to lead to recessionary conditions.
The contrast with Argentina – where there are aggressive moves to curb inflation and reduce the size of government – were stark, added Mr Berneck.
The company is expecting demand for panel products to be entering a weaker cycle.
“Last year we had a weak beginning for 2024, then we had a very robust second semester, mainly because the president is trying to inject money into the economy. We also had a huge flood in the south of the country, which damaged millions of houses, and this helped increase the demand a little bit, but we are seeing an end of this now.
“I think that things are a little bit worse because our currency has devalued, the price of food has increased tremendously and the official inflation rate – claimed to be 5.5% a year – is hard to believe.”
The rise in basic consumer costs is a hindrance to consumption, with a decreasing volume of general sales activity reported in the country.
“All the producers [in the panels industry] are producing at around 85% capacity utilisation rate, in my opinion,” commented Mr Berneck.
“We had a nice January; February was OK and now in March we have seen a decrease, and I think it is a trend and we’re observing a very fast deterioration of the economy.”
The subject of new US tariffs came up in our conversation. At time of writing, tariffs of around 25% stood to be levied in April on Brazilian wood product exports to the US.
Mr Berneck said several panel producers sell a lot of PB and MDF products to the US, with lumber, plywood and cellulose also representing significant volumes.
“Even though we don’t have a significant amount of products sold to the US, there is the indirect impact due to the wood industry [customers] selling there. If we sell our products to Asia or Mexico, then many of the finished products end up in the US, so there is going to be an impact.”
The company hopes that Brazil’s industry associations will lobby to defend the wood products sector’s interests and negotiate. A tariff of 25% is at a level that could preclude sending products to the US market – including mouldings and plywood for the housing industry.
Summarising the position of the Brazilian panels industry, Mr Berneck said producers had learned to live with the difficult market conditions stretching from the end of 2022 to H1 2024. Reduced production, lower staffing levels, and streamlining of operations have been implemented widely. Therefore, panel sector investment potential looks weaker than it did a few years ago.
However, Berneck’s long history, expertise, innovation and low debt levels have created a strong resilience in its business.
“We are family-owned and we have a nice cushion of liquidity, which always helps in these hard times. All the family members invest only in our business and not anything else. That’s what we believe in, and we will keep doing.”
Additionally, Berneck’s forest ownership gives it control of half its raw material input, giving an edge on some competitors.
“We have a renowned product in the market and people pay a premium in certain instances.
“We will keep investing in different production processes to improve the quality of our products.”
