The European Confederation of Woodworking Industries (CEI-Bois) welcomes today’s publication of the Housing Package and stands ready to support EU policymakers in delivering on the announced initiatives. The construction sector is a key driver of economic growth, employment and regional development across Europe, generating strong multiplier effects throughout the economy and supporting millions of jobs along complex value chains. When construction is anchored in the use of sustainable materials, such as wood, it becomes a powerful engine for both growth and climate resilience.
The timber sector has environmentally sustainable, commercially available solutions that are ready to play a key role in addressing Europe’s acute housing affordability crisis.
Wood-based construction enables faster building times, lower construction costs, and greater cost predictability compared to other conventional materials, particularly through industrialised and off-site construction methods that increase productivity, reduce waste and shorten delivery times. Industrial timber construction allows housing supply to scale up more rapidly, while ensuring consistent quality and high energy performance. Alleviating Europe’s acute housing affordability crisis requires increasing the productivity and competitiveness of the construction ecosystem as a whole, while ensuring that affordability and sustainability go hand in hand in view of the EU’s objective of achieving climate neutrality by 2050.
The European Affordable Housing Plan, the European Strategy for Housing Construction, and the expansion of the New European Bauhaus have the potential to advance these policy priorities, particularly by:
• recognising the growing need for new, sustainable construction across Europe;
• maintaining momentum and supporting the renovation wave;
• promoting the affordability and sustainability benefits of industrialised construction
combined with circular, bio-based materials.
As the focus now shifts to implementation, which should proceed without delay, several critical financial, regulatory, and standardisation challenges remain. These can, however, be addressed through targeted and coordinated measures at both European and national level, such as inter alia:
• Enable access to diverse revenue streams, such as carbon storage credits;
• Improve access to capital and insurance;
• Ensure stable demand through strategic public procurement;
• Undertake deep regulatory simplification and streamlining;
• Harmonise national building codes;
• Simplify and accelerate permitting processes;
• Speed up the update and development of harmonised construction products;
• Allocate resources for the consistent implementation of the second-generation
Eurocodes;
• Align standardised methodologies for assessing environmental sustainability with EU
policies and legislation;
• Deliver on the European Commission’s 2025 priority to advance bio-based standards.
CEI-Bois stands ready to work with EU and national authorities to swiftly implement the Housing
Package, ensuring that Europe delivers affordable housing faster while strengthening economic
growth and sustainable construction.
For further information
[email protected]
