Latvijas Finieris is adding another major project to an investment cycle that has steadily expanded its birch plywood business across Northern Europe. The group will invest more than \u20ac70 million at Kohila Vineer in Estonia, where construction is due to begin at the end of August and a new production line is scheduled to start operating in early 2028.<\/p>\n
The Kohila project follows the \u20ac100 million expansion of Verems in eastern Latvia and a \u20ac15 million programme underway at Sastamala in Finland. At the same time, Latvijas Finieris is examining a much larger new wood-processing project in Latvia's Latgale region, where the potential investment has been estimated at around \u20ac300 million.<\/p>\n
Not all of these projects are at the same stage, and the Latgale proposal remains dependent on infrastructure and other decisions. But the direction is increasingly clear. Latvijas Finieris is adding processing capacity, spreading production across a wider geographical area and building a raw-material system that relies less heavily on Latvia alone.<\/p>\n
The expansion comes against a relatively solid financial background. Latvijas Finieris Group generated turnover of \u20ac413.85 million in 2025, up 1.2% from the previous year, while profit reached \u20ac51.91 million. The company has been working towards annual revenue above \u20ac500 million as the current investment cycle feeds through into production.<\/p>\n
From Verems to Kohila<\/strong><\/p>\n The largest project already completed is the expansion of Verems near R\u0113zekne in Latvia.<\/p>\n Around \u20ac100 million was invested in the mill, lifting annual plywood capacity from approximately 45,000 m\u00b3 to 85,000 m\u00b3. The project added 19,964 m\u00b2 of new space, bringing the total plant area to 49,228 m\u00b2.<\/p>\n New processing equipment was installed alongside existing production, including a large-format plywood processing line and a specialised puttying line. Raute supplied the main production equipment, while Latvijas Finieris also developed part of the technology internally.<\/p>\n The additional production is expected to generate more than \u20ac30 million in annual exports. Verems itself recorded turnover of around \u20ac50 million in 2025.<\/p>\n While Verems represents a substantial increase in plywood capacity inside Latvia, the next projects are putting more investment outside the group's home market.<\/p>\n In Finland, Latvijas Finieris is investing \u20ac15 million at Riga Wood Finland in Sastamala. The project includes a new birch veneer peeling line, additional automation and modernised production technology. Construction started in 2025, machinery installation is scheduled for autumn 2026 and the new line should enter operation in early 2027.<\/p>\n Estonia is now next. Kohila Vineer has received the construction permit for an expansion worth more than \u20ac70 million, of which approximately \u20ac20 million will be invested this year. The construction contract was signed on August 7, with work expected to begin at the end of August.<\/p>\n Management says Kohila has already moved substantially beyond the production capacity initially planned for the site. The new investment will allow Latvijas Finieris to increase birch plywood production further while adding technology and broadening the mill's product range.<\/p>\n Major Latvijas Finieris investment projects<\/strong><\/p>\n *Approximate investment indicated by the Latvian government. The Latgale project remains at an earlier stage and should not be counted as committed investment on the same basis as Verems, Sastamala and Kohila.<\/em><\/p>\n The three projects already completed or moving through implementation represent more than \u20ac185 million. The proposed Latgale development would take the scale of the expansion considerably further if it proceeds.<\/p>\n The Latgale project is currently being discussed with Latvian authorities, with railway access and competitive freight tariffs among the main issues still to be resolved. The government has described the potential investment as one of the largest industrial projects under consideration in Latvia.<\/p>\n More production outside Latvia<\/strong><\/p>\n The geographical distribution of the investment is as important as the amount being spent.<\/p>\n Latvijas Finieris has been gradually moving towards a production model in which wood procurement, veneer production and final plywood manufacturing are distributed across several countries around the Baltic Sea.<\/p>\n The group operates manufacturing activities in Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania and Finland, while its sourcing network has increasingly extended into Sweden.<\/p>\n This is partly a question of securing sufficient birch. Latvijas Finieris processes more than 900,000 m\u00b3 of birch logs annually, and management has repeatedly made clear that future growth cannot depend entirely on additional Latvian raw material.<\/p>\n The company eventually expects as much as half of its wood resources to originate outside Latvia.<\/p>\n That strategy became particularly visible during the 2025\/26 harvesting season. Through Riga Wood Sweden, Latvijas Finieris shipped more than 13,000 m\u00b3 of birch veneer logs from Karlstad to its Latvian operations, in addition to volumes moving through V\u00e4ster\u00e5s and other Swedish ports.<\/p>\n Sweden offers an opportunity because substantial quantities of birch that could meet veneer specifications still enter the pulpwood market. Latvijas Finieris has consequently been developing relationships with sawmills, forest owner associations and timber buyers to separate veneer-quality logs before they are directed to pulp production.<\/p>\n Kohila takes the strategy one step further<\/strong><\/p>\n The latest Estonian investment illustrates another side of the same strategy.<\/p>\n Despite spending more than \u20ac70 million to increase production at Kohila, Latvijas Finieris does not expect the expanded plant to consume more Estonian veneer logs.<\/p>\n Additional requirements will instead be covered partly with peeled veneer brought from elsewhere in the region.<\/p>\n The company has linked that decision directly to uncertainty surrounding Estonia's forestry policy and its possible effect on future raw-material availability and the operating environment.<\/p>\n It is an important distinction. Latvijas Finieris remains willing to commit substantial capital to industrial production in Estonia, but it is not making that additional capacity dependent on securing larger volumes of Estonian birch.<\/p>\n The arrangement also allows more processing to take place close to the available raw material. Birch can be sourced and peeled in one part of the Baltic-Nordic network before veneer is moved to another plant for subsequent processing.<\/p>\n Sastamala fits naturally into this structure. Its new peeling line will increase the group's ability to process Finnish birch locally from 2027 rather than transporting all raw material in log form.<\/p>\n Plywood production already moving higher<\/strong><\/p>\n The expansion programme is taking place while Latvijas Finieris is already increasing plywood output.<\/p>\n Production reached approximately 344,000 m\u00b3 in 2025, compared with 333,000 m\u00b3 in 2024 and 323,000 m\u00b3 in 2023. Deliveries rose from around 297,000 m\u00b3 in 2023 to 316,000 m\u00b3 last year.<\/p>\n The increases have so far been gradual, but much of the new capacity was not yet fully reflected in those figures.<\/p>\n Verems alone has added around 40,000 m\u00b3 of nominal annual plywood capacity. Sastamala will provide additional veneer-processing capacity from early 2027, followed by the expanded Kohila operation in 2028.<\/p>\n The company has therefore entered a period in which several investments made or started over the previous few years will begin contributing simultaneously.<\/p>\n Investment goes beyond additional plywood<\/strong><\/p>\n Not all of the spending is directed at producing more panels.<\/p>\n Latvijas Finieris has also invested in machinery production, chemical technology and higher-value uses for the by-products generated during plywood manufacturing.<\/p>\n One example is its work with betulin, extracted from birch bark for applications outside the traditional wood industry. Another is the development of resins in which renewable lignin can replace part of the fossil-derived phenol traditionally used in plywood adhesives.<\/p>\n These projects are important to the broader strategy because only part of each birch log eventually becomes plywood. Increasing the value obtained from bark and other residual streams gives the group another route to growth without requiring an equivalent increase in timber consumption.<\/p>\n The company has also been directing an unusually large share of internally generated funds back into production and research. Its strategy announced earlier in the current investment cycle envisaged more than \u20ac400 million being directed towards industrial assets, technology and development between 2023 and 2027.<\/p>\n The \u20ac500 million target comes into view<\/strong><\/p>\n When Latvijas Finieris outlined its ambition to exceed \u20ac500 million in annual revenue, much of the capacity needed to support that target was still under construction.<\/p>\n That picture has changed. The \u20ac100 million Verems expansion is complete. The \u20ac15 million Sastamala project is moving towards equipment installation. More than \u20ac70 million has now been committed to Kohila, with construction ready to begin. At the same time, the company is exploring a potential Latgale project on a scale far beyond the individual investments completed so far.<\/p>\n The raw-material strategy is changing alongside the factories. Latvia remains the centre of the business, but Finland, Estonia and increasingly Sweden are becoming more important to the flow of birch through the group.<\/p>\n This may ultimately be the more significant part of the expansion. Latvijas Finieris is not simply building additional plywood capacity. It is creating a wider Baltic-Nordic production system in which birch can be sourced in one country, peeled in another and converted into higher-value products wherever the group has the most suitable industrial capacity.<\/p>\n The latest \u20ac70 million-plus commitment at Kohila is another substantial addition to that system \u2014 and, with the new line not due to start until 2028, the effect of the current investment cycle on Latvijas Finieris' production is still some way from being fully visible.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Latvijas Finieris is adding another major project to an investment cycle that has steadily expanded its birch plywood business across Northern Europe.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":99618,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"Default","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5204],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-99617","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily-news"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\n\n
\n Location \/ project<\/th>\n Investment<\/th>\n Main development<\/th>\n Status<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n \n Verems, Latvia<\/strong><\/td>\n \u20ac100m<\/strong><\/td>\n Plywood capacity increased from around 45,000 to 85,000 m\u00b3\/year; new processing lines<\/td>\n Completed 2026<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Sastamala, Finland<\/strong><\/td>\n \u20ac15m<\/strong><\/td>\n New birch veneer peeling line, automation and production technology<\/td>\n Start-up early 2027<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Kohila, Estonia<\/strong><\/td>\n \u20ac70m+<\/strong><\/td>\n Additional birch plywood capacity, new technology and broader product range<\/td>\n Construction from August 2026; start-up early 2028<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Latgale, Latvia<\/strong><\/td>\n ~\u20ac300m*<\/strong><\/td>\n Proposed new wood-processing facility<\/td>\n Planning and infrastructure stage<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n \n\n
\n Year<\/th>\n Plywood production<\/th>\n Plywood deliveries<\/th>\n Group turnover<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2023<\/strong><\/td>\n 323,000 m\u00b3<\/td>\n 297,000 m\u00b3<\/td>\n ~\u20ac405m<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2024<\/strong><\/td>\n 333,000 m\u00b3<\/td>\n 309,000 m\u00b3<\/td>\n ~\u20ac409m<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2025<\/strong><\/td>\n 344,000 m\u00b3<\/strong><\/td>\n 316,000 m\u00b3<\/strong><\/td>\n \u20ac413.85m<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n