Shock revelation on 1 er march in an article in the World an investigation by the Deforestation Inc. project has uncovered illegal links between two paper companies, Indonesia's Asia Pulp & Paper and Canada's Paper Excellence.
The Deforestation Inc. project is a commitment made by over 100 countries at COP26 in late 2021 to end deforestation by 2030. One hundred and forty journalists - including two from World - within the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) have conducted an international investigation to " unveil the mechanisms that make environmental predation possible" .
According to Le Monde, Asia Pulp & Paper and Paper Excellence would be in cahoots to take over the world paper market with the knowledge of the various organizations that are supposed to prevent this kind of agreement.
Two groups that nothing seems to connect...
The Indonesian group, which has been accused of deforestation for more than twenty years, had its FSC sustainable wood management label withdrawn in 2007 for the practice of forest destruction. Without this certification, Asia Pulp & Paper loses several markets such as the supply of packaging for Mattel, Lego and Disney.
Paper Excellence was created in 2006 and began a series of acquisitions, including two french sites, in Tarascon in Bouches-du-Rhône and Saint-Gaudens in Haute-Garonne, under the name of Fibre Excellence.
Two groups that nothing obviously connects... The investigators would seem to have proved the contrary.
... but who is pulling the strings?
At the head of Asia Pulp & Paper until the end of 2022 is Teguh Widjaja. At the head of Paper Excellence is Jackson... Widjaja, the son. The same Indonesian family seems to be at the helm of two companies that declare themselves to be "two completely separate entities".
The file put together by the investigators would gather a lot of evidence in the form of documents and emails, coming from former executives and a whistleblower, attesting to the commercial exchanges uniting the two groups, the existing connections from the top to the bottom, the functions performed simultaneously in both entities...
Thus, the FSC certification of Paper Excellence would benefit Asia Pulp & Paper and the right to competition would be seriously questioned. In fact, two so-called independent companies are forbidden to exchange confidential information, particularly in relation to pricing," says The World .
Paper Excellence is reportedly in the process of buying two other paper companies, Eldorado in Brazil with its 350,000 hectares of certified forests and Canadian Resolute Forest Products. According to the company, its annual revenues would reach The World 10 billion. And with the estimated 14 billion euros of the Indonesian, the union of the two companies would represent the largest paper group in the world.
Fibre Excellence's response is unequivocal
Fibre Excellence, which employs 650 people at its two sites, issued a denial on March 2.
The French subsidiary of Paper Excellence assures that it has no link with the Indonesian group, and guarantees to respect the FSC and PEFC standards and to charge market prices.
Praised in the spring of 2022 for her role in the rescue of the Veolia recycled paper plant at Chapelle-Darblay in Normandy the subsidiary is a defender of the industry and jobs in Europe.
120 million to modernize its two French sites and study the impact of the new technologies on the company's operations "investment projects in France worth several hundred million euros over the next five years .
It should be noted, however, that Radio France's investigative unit, the 1 er march, indicated that, according to the office of Bruno Lemaire, Minister of Economy, Finance and Industrial and Digital Sovereignty, "Fibre Excellence had benefited from more than 70 million euros of public aid. But concerning its links with APP, he believes that he cannot express himself, as the company is likely to be the subject of investigations by the DGCCRF (General Directorate for Competition, Consumer Affairs and Fraud Control) ."
