Packaging mills spared in latest Stora Enso closures

The Finnish paper and board manufacturer has announced that it will permanently close its Sunila Pulp Mill and Tolkkinen Sawmill as well as its uncoated fine paper machine at its Imatra Mill.

Provisional plans are also in place to close the Verkaus newsprint mills and attempts to sell the Kotka mills will also be resumed in early 2010.

The closures, including the sale of the Kotka Mill, will affect a total of 1605 Stora Enso employees.

“We have tried to move as fast as possible, but it has not been fast enough,” said chief executive Jouko Karvinen of the cost-saving programme implemented two years ago.

“As we cannot change this operating environment, we will instead continue to change Stora Enso so we can operate in the new environment and ensure a brighter future for the Group,” he said.

Stora Enso operates 26 packaging board mills across the world.

This month M-real increased its folding-boxboard prices by £80 per tonne in the UK, following in the footsteps of Iggesund Paperboard.

The new followed the publication of Stora Enso’s first quarter results in July, which reported a pre-tax profit, excluding non-recurring items, of EUR 47.2m on sales of EUR 2.2bn. This is up from a pre-tax loss of EUR 82m.

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