Analysis

Svenska Cellulosa buys 10,000 hectares of Latvian forest

Svenska Cellulosa (SCA), Europe’s largest private forest holding company, which produces paper, pulp and wood products has acquired a total of 10,000 hectares of land and forest from the Latvian Forest Company for 26.2 million euros.

SCA has been buying timber from the Baltic countries for decades, and most analysts believe that it was only a matter of time before the giant decided to secure its investment in the region.

“We have been in the Baltic states for a long time as a buyer of timber,” explains SCA’s Jonas Mårtensson. “The Baltic states are a natural part of the base for our raw material supply and our operations there are strengthened by a forest asset of our own. We may well consider more acquisitions of forest land in the Baltics.”

SCA acquired the subsidiaries of Latvian Forest Company that own the actual forest and land resources and closed the deal on April 8 . The assets purchased comprise of 7,600 hectares of productive forest land, 2,000 hectares of farmland and an additional 800 hectares of land.