Stora Enso acquires Bergvik forest assets

January 9, 2019
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Stora Enso acquires Bergvik forest assets

The shareholders of Bergvik Skog AB, a Swedish forest holding company, have signed a binding agreement regarding the previously announced intent to restructure its ownership. With this agreement, the parties aim to complete the transaction during the first half of 2019.

Stora Enso’s forest holdings in Sweden will increase to 1.4 million ha, of which 1.15 million ha is productive forestland. The total value of the transaction in Stora Enso’s balance sheet is estimated to be approximately €1bn.

“I am pleased that we have taken a step forward in this ownership restructuring along with the other shareholders in Bergvik Skog,” said Karl-Henrik Sundstrom, Stora Enso’s chief executive officer.

“This transaction is a natural next step for us, as we strongly believe in the bioeconomy and want to secure our competitive raw material supply for the long term. With direct ownership, we will have better visibility of our wood supply in Sweden. This will give us better opportunities to further develop sustainable forest management, thus strengthening our competitiveness,”.
Currently, Bergvik Skog’s Swedish forest assets are owned by its subsidiaries Bergvik Vast AB and Bergvik Ost AB, representing approximately 83% and 17% of these assets respectively.

As a result of this transaction, Stora Enso will transform its current ownership of 49.8% in Bergvik Skog, to a direct holding of 69.8% of the value of the forest assets in Bergvik Vast.