Japanese firm buys 328ha Northland pine plantation from family trust

A Japanese forestry firm has bought more than 300ha of land planted in pine forest near Kaitaia.

Summit Forests New Zealand, which is fully owned by Sumitomo Corporation of Japan, bought the 328ha Duncan Rd forestry block from the Braemar Family Trust.

Permission for the sale was granted by the Overseas Investment Office (OIO) in June but has only just been made public.

Summit Forests already owns significant forestry assets in Northland as well as harvesting consents for forests it leases.

According to the OIO the company wanted to buy the forest to combat a projected wood supply shortage in 2020-23. The key benefits of the sale included the forest becoming Forest Stewardship Council certified and increased processing of wood in Northland.

About 80 per cent of the wood harvested from Summit's Northland estate was processed in New Zealand, the OIO said.

Normally the OIO reports the sale price when land is sold to overseas investors but in this case, as with two previous land purchases in Northland, the price was withheld. The reason given was that the information would be likely to "unreasonably prejudice a person's commercial position".

Other recent land sales to overseas interests include a 316ha farm and a 18ha waterfront property in the Kerikeri area to tobacco magnate Andre Calantzopoulos, and 37ha at Russell's Long Beach to Austrian tennis player and former world number one Thomas Muster.