Helsinki, Finland – Finnish paper and packaging producer Stora Enso said Thursday it plans to close four European sites and lay off 1,150 employees, partly due to the fallout from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“These measures are of course very difficult and would not be proposed unless it was absolutely necessary for our long-term competitiveness,” chief executive Annica Bresky said in a statement.
The company plans to permanently close its Sunila pulp production unit in Finland, the De Hoop containerboard site in the Netherlands, one containerboard line at its Ostroleka site in Poland, and the Napi sawmill in Estonia.
Stora Enso said that discontinued wood imports from Russia have resulted in increased competition for pulpwood, making the Sunila site no longer cost-effective.
Previously Finland’s most important supplier of wood, Russian imports to the country stopped in July 2022 following Western sanctions imposed after the war in Ukraine.
In March 2022, Stora Enso stopped all its production and sales in Russia in response to Moscow’s invasion.
The Dutch and Polish closures are due to overcapacity in the European containerboard market.
The company said it also planned to make cuts among office employees.
Stora Enso, which employs 22,000 people in over a dozen countries around the world, including South America and China, said the closures would take place between 2023 and 2024.
The planned restructuring actions would result in a 380 million euro ($411 million) hit to Stora Enso’s annual sales.
The company’s net profit dropped by 35.4 percent to 185 million euros in the first quarter of 2023, compared to the same period a year before.
