Teak has always been the principal
species in the plantation programmes of
Bangladesh. More than 70% of total plantation in the hill forests is composed
of Teak (Andersen 1969, Slavicky 1978,
White 1979).

Fibre dimension indicates the suitability
of a vegetable fibrous raw material for
making pulp. About 600 species of hardwoods,
about 20 species of bamboos and
a few species of grass are available in the
forests of Bangladesh. Of these, 40 woods, 13
bamboos, 6 grasses and 10 miscellaneous
fibrous materials are reported in this
review. None of these species can alone
feed any paper mill except Gewa wood
which is exclusively used for newsprint
pulp at Khulna Newsprint Mills. Karnaphuli
Paper and Rayon Mills are utilising
a few bamboo species along with other hardwoods. Grasses like Nal, Khagra &
Ekrah are partly used in Sylhet Pulp Mills.
Most of the wood, bamboo and grass
species are found scattared all over the
forests of Chittagong, Chittagong Hill Tracts
and Sylhet. Due to inaccessibility into
forest and heavy cost of felling and transportation,
few of these species can be used
economically as pulping raw material.
However, this report will be useful to pulp,
paper and board industries in finding out
alternative species to the present source of
raw materials.

The gluing characteristics of many of
the indigenous timber species of Bangladesh
are not known. Adequate knowledge of
the gluing characteristics is essential for
optimum utilization of the timber resources
by the repsective industries like plywood
and laminated wood. It is established a
fact that gluability is a function of density
of wood, its structure, presence of extraneous
materials, etc. The study was undertaken
in finding out the gluability of Champa
veneer in the manufacture of plywood. Champa (Michelia champaca) a large
tree with a long straight cylindrical bole of
18 to 21 m in length and often of large
girth, is found in the Chittagong Hill
Tracts forests of Bangladesh. It is light,
(sp. gr. approx. 0.53), soft, straight grained,
even and medium textured. Its sapwood is
white, and the heartwood is light yellowish
brown to olive-brown, somewhat lustrous,
smooth working and takes good polish.
It weighs 497 to 546 kg/m3 at 12 percent
moisture content. The timber dries well