| Tyumen is mastering cardboard and paper production A new cardboard and paper mill will be built in the Tyumen region by the end of this year. The project worth $123 million is being implemented by the administration of the city of Uvat, which intends to attract loans secured by forest areas. The new enterprise, according to forestry companies, will be comparable in production volumes to industry leaders.
According to the Vremya Novostei newspaper, a place has already been allocated for an industrial site in the Tyumen region and a business plan has been developed for the construction of a cardboard and paper production facility. Officially, the Uvat mayor's office does not comment on the details of the project. An informed source says that for now the project is stuck at the stage of finding a source of financing. This is confirmed by the director of the industry department of the government of the Tyumen region, Vladimir Zamyatin. According to him, “the shareholders and investors” of the enterprise have not yet been determined. However, according to the leader of the Russian timber industry Ilim Pulp, the plant could be built by the end of this year. Ilim Pulp's director for timber business development, Dmitry Chuiko, believes that for $123 million it is possible to build “a fairly large enterprise, the volume of which should be approximately 1-1.3 million tons of products per year.” Whereas the largest enterprises now produce no more than 750 thousand tons.
New production can easily compete with existing enterprises. The fact is that they are all located either in the north of the European part of Russia or in the Far East. The central part remains uncovered. According to the head of the Lesprom.ru trade and information system, Yuri Gorokhov, in the center of the country there is no developed cardboard and paper production and paper is imported from other regions. Therefore, he believes, the project should pay off approximately five to six years after its launch. “If the enterprise is established in the vicinity of the Trans-Siberian Railway,” says Mr. Gorokhov, “then it will be doubly profitable, since the products of the new enterprise can easily be exported, for example, to China. In this case, the project will pay off faster.” Maya KVASKOVA |
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