UPM Completes Sale of Stracel Mill to Blue Paper

UPM, Helsinki, Finland, reports that it has completed the sale of assets and part of the land of the UPM Stracel paper mill site to Blue Paper SAS, the joint venture company of VPK Packaging Group NV and Klingele Papierwerke. Blue Paper SAS will convert the mill to produce recycled fiber-based fluting and test liner. Production is expected to start after completing investments in the autumn of 2013. Blue Paper SAS is creating 130 new jobs at the mill that have been offered to former Stracel employees.

"We are very pleased that we have been able to find a good solution to the Stracel mill. Blue Paper offers a new industrial future for the site and a new opportunity for a number of Stracel employees. We want to express our thanks to all the parties involved in this process," said Jyrki Ovaska, president of the UPM Paper Business Group.

The sale of Stracel was part of UPM's plan to adjust its magazine paper and newsprint paper capacity to match the needs of its global customer base originally announced in August 2011. UPM stopped the production of coated magazine paper at the mill this past January 4.

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