A.W. Jenkinson Forest Products was formed in the mid-1960s when founder, Allan Jenkinson, took the initiative to collect unwanted sawdust and wood shavings from the sawmills around Cumbria and the Borders using a single tractor and trailer. He then transported the timber co-product to the area’s farms where sawdust was, and still is, in great demand as livestock and pet bedding.

This innovative, original approach with its positive environmental drive, has characterised the work of Allan and his team in the intervening years and has remained an important part of the business ever since. Demand outstripped the locally available supply of sawdust needed to supply A.W. Jenkinson Forest Product’s growing customer base. This led to partnerships being formed further afield, rapidly growing the business which now supplies customers across the UK and northern Europe.

To better serve the targeted needs of its extensive third party customer base, as well as the ongoing and expanding transport requirements of the wider A.W. Jenkinson group, the logistics operation was incorporated in spring 2014 to create A.W. Jenkinson Transport Limited.

Today A.W. Jenkinson Forest Products and its associated businesses handle over 3 million tonnes of roundwood, chips, shavings, sawdust, bark, green waste and other timber co-products each year, collected from forestry sites, sawmills and other wood processing industries throughout the UK. A.W. Jenkinson’s services link forestry, sawmilling, wood processing, building and demolition sectors with the demands of pulp, paper and panel manufacture, energy generation, agriculture, horticulture and amenity markets in an environmentally responsible cycle that makes maximum use of one of the world’s dwindling resources.

In line with government waste, energy and sustainability targets, A.W. Jenkinson Forest Products has invested heavily in the environmentally responsible processing facilities required for waste wood recovery and recycling through the wholly owned company, A.W. Jenkinson Woodwaste Limited.

A.W. Jenkinson Woodwaste operates facilities at Carlisle, and in Scotland at Bo’ness near Grangemouth, Glasgow, Ayrshire and Aberdeen.

Company operations are centred on the recycling of waste wood as well as green waste, which is composted at Hespin Wood. The highly successful site just north of Carlisle is the first of numerous green recycling facilities currently in development.

Located close to large urban centres, these new sites will collect household and commercial waste, manufacturing high grade compost and chipped timber for use in Panel Board Mills and as a moisture regulator in the blending of biomass power generation fuel.