Can the market withstand the continued pressure of rising paper prices?

From the outbreak of the epidemic in China in March to the end of June, within four months, a number of well-known paper companies, including Chenming, IP Sun, APP, and Huatai, issued five consecutive price increase letters, involving offset paper, art paper and other cultural paper products, the cumulative increase per ton is more than 26%.

Beginning in March, tenders for autumn teaching aid materials have been launched in various regions, and the demand for publishing and printing has increased, which has given paper mills the confidence to raise prices. In addition, it was also affected by the increase in pulp prices. This year's pulp prices remained high for a long time, and supply-side incidents continued to occur in major international pulp producing countries, which also affected the global pulp supply.

The epidemic has blocked supply chains such as raw material imports. On the other hand, the closure and control of some parts of the country have led to rising logistics costs. This is also confirmed by the first quarter financial report released by Chenming Paper. The announcement shows that due to the impact of the domestic epidemic, especially the regional epidemic in Shandong and Jilin production bases, logistics have been hindered, affecting its shipment volume of about 150,000 tons.

The context of the rise in the price of cultural paper, the outbreak of the epidemic, the difficulty of book storage, and the bleak offline and online sales have made the publishing and printing industry chain-related enterprises even worse. Paper prices have fluctuated frequently in the past two years, and many publishing units and printing companies have planned to increase paper inventories since the beginning of the year to counteract short-term price fluctuations.

After experiencing the tumbling and rising paper prices in 2021, publishing units have gradually figured out some ways to deal with paper price fluctuations, including adjusting book prices, adjusting paper types and gram weights, and appropriately increasing stocking.