Plastun, located in the most eastern reaches of Russia, is a small port town in the country’s Maritime Province. About nine hours’ drive from Vladivostok, this little place is host to one of Russia’s largest integrated forestry companies. A partner of Sumitomo Corporation, OAO Terneyles owns about 2.6 million hectares of forest. With 45% of the company under its control, Sumitomo Corporation worked with OAO Terneyles to develop huge facilities, which having launched operation in April 2009, now process about 80% of timbers produced from the forest. Those processed timbers are then exported to Asia, including Japan, China and South Korea.
This initiative was begun not only to enable the procurement of high quality timbers but also to open the way to a new era of timber trade between Russia and Japan. This challenging project, it has been made possible by an unshakeable partnership between the two companies as well as the individual commitment of all involved.