Metsä Group makes nearly all of its purchases in Europe.

Responsible purchasing in Europe

Supply chain, purchasing and transportation

Wood is the main raw material for all of our products. Metsä Forest is responsible for wood supply for the Group, and wood supply is its core business operation. We cooperate closely with wood suppliers and harvesting contractors and promote sustainable forestry through training and cooperation with stakeholders.

In addition to wood, we purchase fibre, chemicals and other materials, as well as machinery, equipment and services, in a centralised manner. Metsä Group’s external purchases total nearly EUR 3 billion annually. We aim to use local suppliers if possible. In 2018, 85% of our purchases came from countries where we have production sites. 97% of our purchases, excluding wood, came from Europe.

Responsible value chain

We cooperate with suppliers that meet our requirements in terms of reliable operations, ethical and environmental principles, quality and pricing. Our suppliers must comply with our Supplier Code of Conduct and Metsä Group’s sustainability principles. This serves to ensure that there are no risks related to corruption or child labour or other violations of human rights. We further develop cooperation with selected key suppliers and seek to concentrate our purchases with them. Each new subcontractor, goods supplier and service provider must sign our Supplier Code of Conduct. By the end of 2018, 92% of our total spend was covered by the Metsä Group Code of Conduct for Suppliers. During the year we continued performing audits based on category plans and the sustainability criteria were included in 64 audits.

Auditing key raw-material suppliers with a risk rating

In 2013, Metsä set a Group-wide target to audit all of its risk-rated raw material key vendors against sustainability criteria by the end of 2015. These risk assessments examine the operations of the suppliers from various perspectives, such as responsibility, commitment to sustainability principles, the environment and ethical working conditions. Risks related to the locations of their production units and the countries of origin of their raw materials are among the risks considered.

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Values guide Metsä Group's operations 
 

Global transports

Metsä Group's products are transported to about 120 countries by road, rail and sea. This requires an extensive logistics network. We partner with more than 1,000 logistics service providers, mainly in Continental Europe and in Finland which makes us a significant indirect employer. Wood is the main transported raw material and in addition we transport raw materials such as chemicals, binders and pigments and ready wood products, paperboards and tissue papers.

Negative impacts of logistics are mitigated with careful route planning, minimising transported distances and developing more efficient operations and guidelines. Products are transported in largest quantities possible. This reduces cost and emissions.

ensuring the sustainability of main logistics flows

In 2015, we set a target to ensure the sustainability of our main logistics flows by the end of 2017. To serve this purpose, we carried out an extensive survey. The suppliers included in this survey represented around 90% of our annual spend in logistics. The content of the survey was based on our Supplier Code of Conduct and other sustainability requirements. At the end of 2017, all of the logistics suppliers covered by the survey met our sustainability requirements.

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