Regional focus
Developing Guangxi
ANNA GUSTAFSSON, Photo: Shutterstock
Guangxi Province in South China is making the most of its optimal location and fast-developing infrastructure. Thanks to substantial investments, paper and board production capacity in the area is set to boom.
Guangxi province is famous for its stunning scenery of lush val- leys, picturesque rice terraces and the Guilin mountains and wa- ters, attracting millions of visitors every year. Recently, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, roughly the size of Norway but with a population of over 50 million, has be- come much more than a travel destination. Located optimally as a doorway to nearby Southeast Asian markets, Guangxi is attracting substantial investments from domestic and global paper and pulp industry companies. Guangxi is one of China’s most forest-rich areas, with forest coverage of about 60 per cent, or almost 15 million hectares. The main species in the area are eucalyptus, masson pine, and mul- berry. Eucalyptus plantations alone cover 2.66 million hectares. However, although Guangxi is number one in China for timber production, it has previously been a hub for paper and pulp sales and marketing rather than production. Paper and pulp production in the Guangxi area previously ac- counted for only a few per cent of China’s total production. In the past few years, several paper and pulp companies have announced
major investments to expand operations in the area. Guangxi is increasingly becoming an essential destination for the industry, says Harri Vertanen , Metsä Fibre’s VP Sales, APAC. “Since 2019, several big paper mills have expanded their oper- ations in wood plantations, as well as paper and pulp production in Guangxi. In the next three to five years, Guangxi’s paper and pulp production capacity will reach 25 million tonnes per year,” Vertanen predicts. Fast forward The paper and pulp companies present in the area are large and small. Prominent companies include Sun Paper and APP Guangxi, which both have an annual paper and pulp production capacity of 3.5 million tonnes. Many medium-sized companies have a pro- duction capacity of under 100,000 tonnes per year, such as Qifeng, with 25,000 tonnes of paper production capacity. Alongside APP Guangxi and Sun Paper, companies such as Asia Symbol, Xianhe, Lee & Man, Nine Dragons, Jianhui Paper, and Jiangmen Qiaoyu Paper have all announced investments to sub-
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