By Anton Usov
- EBRD loan of €15 million for new saw mill in south Belarus
- Brownfield facility to produce 250,000 m3 of softwood
- New export markets
The Belarusian wood processing industry will become more competitive following the construction of a new saw mill in south Belarus supported by the EBRD. A new privately-owned sawmill will be constructed on a brownfield site near one of the country’s oldest towns Mozyr.
A 7-year EBRD loan of up to €15 million will finance a production facility, which will annually produce around 250,000 m3 of sawn softwood. It will be exported to existing and new markets.
The Mozyr saw mill, owned by Kaamos Timber (KT) AS of Estonia, will create around 100 new jobs in Mozyr and help KT to almost double its annual production capacity in Belarus to 450,000 m3 of sawn softwood.
The EBRD has worked with KT for more than two decades and successfully implemented a similar project in the town of Vitebsk, in north Belarus.
Since the start of its operations in Belarus in 1992, the EBRD has invested almost €2.7 billion in 119 projects in various sectors of the country’s economy.