Maryvale Mill cuts white paper production: 155 jobs lost

Closing the Maryvale Mill’s white paper line means Australia is now totally dependent on imported copy and printing paper.

The last Australian-made copy paper manufacturing line has closed.

The closure of Australia’s last white paper manufacturing line in the Latrobe Valley’s Maryvale Mill has left at least 155 workers without jobs.

Workers overnight learned Nippon Paper, which owns the mill, had told the Tokyo Stock Exchange that it was permanently closing the white paper line, after native forest pulp log supplies dried up last November in the wake of legal action by environment groups.

CFMEU site president Bill Scott said Australia would now be totally reliant on imports.

A statement released Nippon’s Opal Australian Paper Group said “despite our best endeavours, Opal has been unable to source viable alternative wood supplies to replace the shortfall from VicForests”.

“As a result of this situation, Maryvale Mill produced its last ream of (Reflex and other) copy

paper on 21 January 2023.

“Given this unplanned situation and after significant consideration and analysis of a range of potential operating scenarios, Opal has made the final decision to stop the manufacturing of white pulp and paper at the Maryvale Mill.

“We are continuing to work with the Victorian Government regarding any future support for the Maryvale Mill.”

Mr Scott said the government had been paying workers wages since the white paper line’s closure last month, but only until yesterday, which prompted the company to act on making a final decision.

“It (white paper manufacturing) was viable, if they had left us in sustainable native forestry,” Mr Scott said.

The Andrews government has repeatedly stated workers reliant on native forest harvesting, milling and paper manufacturing could transition to plantation forestry.

But Mr Scott said “the plantations aren’t there”.

Despite allocating $110 million to establishing new plantations in its 2017 budget, the Andrews government did not start allocating contracts to start planting trees until last year.

Meanwhile VicForests is desperately trying to regain access to native forest coupes, mounting an appeal that is due to be heard next month against Supreme Court Justice Melinda Richards’ ruling that locked the state-owned enterprise out of most of its coupes.