Metsä Board invests in paperboards for food service packaging
Metsä Board‘s folding boxboard and fresh forest fibre liner business has grown well in recent years. Demand for responsibly produced, safe and cost-effective products has increased in North America in particular.
A lot will happen at the Husum mill in Sweden during the autumn. Two paper machines will be stopped, and one will be replaced with a new paperboard machine. In addition, personnel will be trained in paperboard production both on-site in Husum and in Finland.
“The new folding boxboard machine at Husum will start operating at the beginning of 2016. The increase in capacity of approximately 400,000 tonnes mainly targeted at North America but also to food service packaging customers worldwide,” says Mika Joukio, CEO of Metsä Board.
New potential end uses for linerboards
Linerboard machine BM2 in Husum is ready to produce 300,000 tonnes of white fresh forest fibre liner every year, used for corrugated board material in retail packaging and other retail materials as well as consumer packaging. Metsä Board aims to increase the annual sales volume of Husum fresh forest fibre liners to approximately 300,000 tonnes.
“We will allocate the increase in linerboard capacity in Husum to North America and Europe. We also have many new potential end uses for linerboard in food packaging and packaging in general,” says Joukio.
Husum completes the transformation
The investment programme in Husum is a significant step in the final stages of Metsä Board’s transformation into a paperboard company. Paper production at the mill is planned to be discontinued for the most part at the end of 2015 and completely by the end of 2017.
“We are investing in Husum because Metsä Board already has a pulp mill, its own harbour and paperboard coating equipment there,” Joukio says.
The reforms at the Husum mill will make it possible to optimise production so that the availability of paperboards from the Finnish mills will also improve. However, in the future, paperboards for food service packaging will be produced in Husum.
