In what could be a surprisingly large hit to the Russian economy, Swedish furniture company Ikea announced it will source wood for its products from the Baltic state, Germany and Poland as well as from its home country, eliminating sources from Russia and Belarus, Reuters reports.
Ikea is one of the globe’s largest wood purchasers, using 20 million cubic meters of wood for its ready-for-assembly flat-pack furniture, packaging, accessories and print material. Russia processes 212 million cubic meters of wood annually, with half of that exported as either raw material or finished products like veneer, making wood Russia’s fifth most valuable export product. Russia accounts for 6% of raw wood supply in the world annually; Belarus adds an additional 5%. (Of course, not all their exports go to Ikea.)
“We have managed to replace those (Russia and Belarus) volumes in other countries on a very hot wood market,” said Ulf Johansson, Global Wood Supply and Forestry Manager at parent company Inter IKEA.