P3 - NEWS

(14.11.2022 / sbr)

Excellent results for Metsä Group in the Finnish Excellence Award 2022 competition

Metsä Board was chosen as Finland’s best organisation in 2022. The company won both the Finnish Circular Economy Award and the Finnish Quality Award presented by Excellence Finland. In addition, Metsä Spring won the Quality Innovation Award, and Metsä Fibre as well as Metsä Forest were recognised for their development work.

“Our role as a forerunner in the fossil free circular economy requires us to continuously challenge our way of thinking and adopt new operating models. Last year's evaluation provided a lot of useful feedback and helped us to identify areas for improvement that we have developed over the year. This year's award shows that we have taken another step forward, for which our entire staff deserves thanks,” says Mika Joukio, CEO of Metsä Board.

The Quality Award recognises the best organisation in Finland that has achieved verifiable excellence in implementing its strategy. Metsä Board received the corresponding awards a year ago.

Metsä Group’s innovation company Metsä Spring and Valmet received the Quality Innovation Award by Excellence Finland for their demo plant, which produces new Muoto® fibre products. The joint project won the category for potential innovations. The jury evaluated the participants based on the criteria of novelty, usability, learning, customer orientation and performance.

“The growing packaging industry requires a variety of new sustainable alternatives; Muoto is our answer to these needs. We’ve moved quickly from an idea that emerged in our internal training programme to a demo plant thanks to our competence and – of course – our excellent partner network. There is every reason to be proud about the Finnish forest industry’s capacity for renewal,” says Jarkko Tuominen, Metsä Group’s Project Director.

Excellence Finland rewarded Metsä Fibre for its international success. Earlier this year, Metsä Fibre achieved an excellent ranking in the EFQM Global Excellence Award, where the company was the first Finnish company to achieve a 7 Diamonds rating.

Metsä Tissue’s Finnish and Baltic operations gained a three-star recognition in the Finnish Quality Award competition. Metsä Forest was recognized for the innovation “Utilising neural networks in estimating growing stock data”.

The quality excellence competitions are based on the international EFQM (European Foundation for Quality Management) model, which Metsä Group uses widely in its long-term operational development.