Romania’s Promateris completes 2.5 mln euro investment in compostable packaging line

BUCHAREST (Romania), June 24 (SeeNews) – Romanian industrial packaging maker Promateris [BSE:PPL] said on Thursday that it has completed a 2.5 million euro ($3 million) investment in a compostable and biodegradable packaging line at its factory in Buftea.

The investment will help grow Promateris individual turnover by 53% between 2019 and 2021, the company said in a press release.

The project created 39 jobs in Buftea, Ilfov county.

The investment was co-financed by a grant of 950,000 euro provided by Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway through the EEA and Norwegian Financial Mechanism 2014-2021, within the SMEs Growth Romania program.

“Our ambition for Promateris is to become the largest European producer of bio-based and compostable bags, sitting at the forefront of green transformation in the EU. We are thrilled to announce the completion of this round of investments in our Buftea factory,” Promateris CEO Tudor Georgescu said.

“Between 2018 and 2021, Promateris has invested over 10 million euro in bio-based packaging and we do not plan to stop here. Our goal is to invest additional 15 million euro over the next five years in projects that respect the principles of the Green Deal launched by the European Union,” he added.

Under the Green Europe project, Promateris signed a partnership agreement with the Norwegian company BioBag, in order to transfer knowledge and export compostable products made in Romania to Scandinavia.

Apart from generating turnover increase in excess of 9 million euro between 2019 and 2021, the project implemented with the help of Innovation Norway, facilitated the transition of Promateris’ decarbonization and the production of low carbon footprint packaging. Promateris installed a technological waste recycling line, which recycled within the first year 1131 tons of technological waste.

Consequently, as of 2021, Promateris recycles 100% of the waste that it generates.

Since 2018, the company reduced its polyethylene production by 99%. In the first quarter of 2021, Promateris was awarded a second grant from Innovation Norway in the amount of 744,000 euro through the same financing scheme.

The aim of the project is to produce biodegradable and compostable raw material, based on corn starch, in the factory in Buftea. Once implemented, Promateris will become the first company in Eastern Europe to produce raw material based on corn starch.

In the first quarter of 2021, Promateris Group, which also includes results of subsidiary, Biodeck, booked consolidated turnover of 35 million lei ($8.5 million/7.1 million euro), up 23% on the year, and an EBITDA of 4.6 million lei, up 7% on the year. Promateris targets a turnover of 250 million lei in 2025, with a forecasted EBITDA of 35 million lei.

Promateris was founded in 1991 as Prodplast and was rebranded in November 2020.

Its shares were trading 11.49% higher at 4.9 lei on Thursday at 1257 CET on the main segment of the Bucharest Stock Exchange.

(1 euro=4.9242 lei)