Converting waste collaboratively into products – Soilfood won Metsä Group’s sustainability competition for suppliers

Metsä Group´s Press Release 20th of December / The Press Release

Soilfood has been selected as the winner of Metsä Group’s sustainability competition for suppliers. The company produces soil improvement materials for farms and recycled materials for industry from the waste and side streams of, for example, the forest industry. This year, Metsä Group invited service and goods suppliers to its first sustainability competition, which received a total of 92 entries.

Soilfood uses side streams containing nitrogen, phosphorus, lime and carbon, among others, in its products.

– Instead of being burned, these materials arising from our production are reused and returned to nature to improve the growth conditions of fields. The material obtained from forest industry waste also reduces the need for new raw materials in the production of fertilisers. Our cooperation with Soilfood is a good example of the circular economy, which benefits all parties, says Katja Tuomola, VP, Sustainability Management at Metsä Group.

– Soilfood was established to make a major shift in the industry’s material efficiency and in the production of agricultural fertilisers and soil improvers. The award that Metsä Group has given us is a truly valuable recognition and proof that we have succeeded in creating value-added beneficial solutions for industry. When the most sustainable solution is the most profitable, everyone wins, says Eljas Jokinen, Group CEO of Soilfood.

The goal of the competition was to acknowledge a partner who provided exemplary support to Metsä Group’s 2030 sustainability targets through its own action and in cooperation with us. The winner, selected by the company’s sustainability management team, promotes our goal of zero process waste to landfill by the end of 2030.

–The 2023 sustainable supplier of the year award is granted to a distinguished partner. However, the sustainability work of all our partners, both big and small, is important because Metsä Group cannot reach its ambitious 2030 sustainability targets without its partners’ efforts. Together we can do more. I would like to thank all the participants for their good cooperation, says Tuomola.