Santiago de Cuba: Modern Sawmills Benefit Timber Heritage

Timber production in Santiago de Cuba has been boosted over the past months because of the action of two cutting-edge mobile sawmills located in Gran Piedra Hill, one of the sites with the largest reservoir of logging trees in the province.

People that go near Gran Piedra say it’s like walking among the clouds. That’s the reason why this place in Santiago is called The Olympus (El Olimpo). Surrounded by the thin mist, a group of sawyers announce its presence with a sound of saws that had never been heard in that mountain range.

It’s all about two state-of-the-art mobile sawmills that, operated by these men, favor the work and saw up trunks in that very place, instead of taking them to El Brujo, 9 miles away, as it used to be.

"We make the most of the day. With both sawmills we total five cubic meters a day. They are also efficient as both only need 20 liters of fuel to work all day long. It’s far less fuel than the amount previously used by trucks to transfer the trunks", Rudy Sierra Calderín, director of El
Olimpo Saw Unit, said.

Managed by Gran Piedra Baconao Forest Integral Company, El Olimpo is a unit that stands out because of its timber heritage. That entity has always made good use of this asset, which has even been affected by natural disasters.

"We suffered after hurricane Sandy because we couldn’t reach the places where there were fallen trees. We’re now capable of facing those circumstances due to the maneuverability of these equipment, so we can go to the most rugged places and do what we have to do", Hiome Castellanos Maren, Head of the Sawyers Group, explained.

El Olimpo Unit is characterized by the sawing quality and the production of planks with impeccable surfaces and edges, and they own it all to this equipment that has improved the performance of Santiago’s Forest Company.