Jakarta. Asia Pacific Resources International Limited, known as April, a management company that controls the pulp and paper businesses of the Tanoto family, held a ground-breaking ceremony for a new Rp 4 trillion ($305 million) paper production facility in Riau province on Friday.
The company released a statement which said the new facility — its third — will produce high grade digital paper, designed for high-quality digital color printing.
“The investment in a third paper mill facility [PM3] announced today increases our ability to meet the growing global demand for premium PaperOneTM products, April Group’s flagship paper brand,” said Tony Wenas, managing director of April Group, Indonesia operation.
“The project involves the deployment of new technology to enable new product diversification to meet evolving consumer demand for high-value digital paper products.” Tony said.
The statement added the mill, which will feature technology capable of producing paper with a speed of 1.4 kilometers per minute, will use 100 percent plantation fiber from existing sources. It will boost the group’s production capacity to 1.15 million per year from the current 820,000 tons per, giving the company additional outputs destined for export markets.
Industry Minister Saleh Husin, who attended the ground-breaking ceremony, said he was pleased to support the company’s efforts to support Indonesia’s economic growth strategies.
“This investment is in line with government’s policy to promote value added export driven industry,” he said in a statement.
“We hope that the manufacturing industry, like the pulp and paper industry that has a competitive advantage, can play a stronger role in boosting national development,” said Saleh.
According to data from the ministry, the installed capacity of the pulp industry is 7.93 million tons per year and 12.98 million per year for paper. Meanwhile, the actual output is about 6.4 million tons per year for pulp and 10.4 million tons of paper per year.
Last year, Indonesia exported 3.5 million tons of pulp worth $1.72 billion and 4.35 million tons of paper with a value of $3.75 billion.
GlobeAsia
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