The Tasman Mill site is a pulp and paper mill located on Fletcher Avenue just outside the town of Kawerau in New Zealand. The Tasman Mill site is the largest single employer in the Eastern Bay of Plenty region. Three pulp or paper companies operate in Kawerau: Norske Skog operate the mechanical pulp mill and paper mill; Oji Fibre Solutions, formerly Carter Holt Harvey, operate the kraft pulp mill; and SCA who manufacture tissue and base paper. The Tasman Pulp and Paper Mill has been a source of controversy due to the discharging of waste into the Tarawera River. Despite protests from locals, resource consent was renewed in 2009 to allow for discharge into the river for the next 25 years.
History
In 1952 the Tasman Pulp and Paper Company established a mill to process timber from maturing stands of Radiata Pine in the state-owned Kaingaroa Forest. The site was chosen because of the ready availability of geothermal steam as a power source. Pulping operations were underway by 1955. In the 1970s a number of expansion projects took place within the mill which in turn led to a significant increase in employees. More recently, introduction of new technology, coupled with the decline of the timber industry from 1980 onwards, has resulted in a decline in the mill's workforce. The 2,000 strong workforce of the mid-1980s had dropped to 1,200 by 1998. In 2000, Fletcher Challenge sold its shareholding in the mill to Norske Skog. The accessibility of geothermal energy recently saw the construction of an on-site 100-megawatt Geothermal power station. The plant provides cost certainty to industry operating within the mill.
Production
Currently Oji Fibre Solutions process approximately 1.25 million cubic metres of wood annually, converting it into specialty bleached and unbleached pulp for use in the manufacture of paper, tissue and building products. Forty percent is subsequently sold to customers in New Zealand, primarily Norske Skog. Today Norske Skog Tasman supplies all of New Zealand's newsprint and telephone directory requirements and also provides around thirty percent of Australia's newsprint requirements. Norske Skog Tasman is a wholly owned subsidiary of Norske Skogindustrier ASA, a Norwegian pulp and paper company based in Oslo. The corporation is the world's largest producer of newsprint magazine paper. Annual paper production by Norske Skog Tasman is now 300,000 tonnes from the company's two paper machines. A third paper machine was recently closed in an attempt to remain competitive in the overseas market. SCA also purchases pulp from Oji Fibre Solutions for manufacture of base paper for their brands Purex and Libra, among others. The balance of production from both Norske Skog and Oji Fibre Solutions is exported throughout Asia and Oceania earning export income of $224 million. In August 2012, Norske Skog announced that it intended to cut production in the face of declining global and regional demand for newsprint. The company stated that it was currently exporting two thirds of its annual production to Asia, but that low newsprint prices, unfavourable exchange rates and oversupply to the Asian region has made this market unprofitable.
