Seeing wood through trees

By PAM GRAHAM

John Palmer, the new chief of the log and wood chip marketing company being formed by Carter Holt Harvey and Central North Island Forest Partnership receiver Ferrier Hodgson, admits his biggest selling point is, "I'm not a Carter Holt person".

The Englishman who has been coming and going from New Zealand for most of his life said he brought Asian experience and neutrality to the job of chief executive of Export Co.

The company will handle 3 million to 3.5 million tonnes of logs and chips, or about half the nation's log and chip exports, for the founders.

The aim is to get more suppliers to agree to the idea of co-ordinating exports to get efficiencies in shipping and marketing once Export Co is up and running by mid-year. It is not an easy task in an industry with a history of distrust between players eyeing both opportunities and challenges and with a so-called "wall of wood" coming on stream.

Palmer admits he knows nothing about trees and he has not been in the job long enough to say much about the sensitive staffing issue. Carter Holt has an export log sales team and the CNIFP does not, so the transition to the new company is tricky when you are selling the idea of independence.

"I don't want to be thought of as the export division of Carters," he said while camped in spare Ferrier Hodgson offices with five staff seconded from Carter Holt.

Palmer is also trying to avoid signalling to customers the idea that New Zealand is trying to form a monopoly to whack up prices.

"That's not what it is about. It is about trying to get efficiencies and build relationships. The idea is to try to shift away from selling just on a spot market because quarterly contracts provide better security of supply to buyers and give vendors the opportunity to organise harvesting and shipping more efficiently."

Palmer's career suggests he is a person willing to try new things. After a first look at New Zealand as a 7-year-old he returned as a teaching graduate on a Government scheme that put him in a classroom with two weeks' training. He taught at several secondary schools in the lower North Island and enjoyed teaching night school in Wellington. "People who came out at 7.30 pm in a howling gale on a Tuesday night wanted to learn."

Marriage to a New Zealander, overseas experience in England and a return to Wellington followed. There he sold galvanised steel coils made at the Glenbrook steel mill to industrial customers, rising to regional manager before leaving to join the construction chemicals company that became known as Fosroc.

He stepped up from marketing manager to Australia-New Zealand marketing manager and then chief executive for New Zealand.

The international owners moved him to Hong Kong in 1993 when China was just opening up.

The company had a joint venture in Shanghai and he set one up in Canton.

He then ran the Asian region, which encompassed most countries.

Next was a move to Birmingham, England, to take over managing a loss-making British unit and expand an undersized European business with acquisitions in France, Czechoslovakia and Spain.

Takeovers in the oil business meant the whole business was up for sale and as the process dragged on, Palmer decided to move on.

"It was always our intention to come back to New Zealand. All the time I was away I was a New Zealand employee, seconded and paying into a New Zealand pension plan."

The 54-year-old says he is not ready to retire and although the CNIFP is for sale he thought Export Co looked interesting. The company does not even have a final name yet.