International trends in forest products consumption: is there convergence?

International data from 1961 to 2005 showed that the coefficient of variation of consumption per capita across countries had tended to decrease over time for all forest products except sawnwood. This convergence of per-capita consumption was confirmed by the trends in Theil's inequality coefficients: the distribution of forest products consumption across countries had become more similar to the distribution of population. The rate of convergence had tended to accelerate during the last 10 years of observation: countries had become more similar in their use of all forest products except sawnwood. The rate of convergence was most rapid for fiberboard, veneer and plywood, and paper and paper board excluding newsprint and other printing and writing paper. The convergence of per-capita consumption of forest products stemmed in large part from lower rates of growth of consumption at higher levels of per-capita consumption, and not from a convergence of per-capita income.