An aerial photo of JNL Gisborne. Inset: Millari Group Australia owner and chief executive Ryan Yari. Photos / Millari Group
The acquisition and reopening of a Gisborne sawmill that closed last year is expected to create 100 jobs for the region and, through local investment, generate an estimated 500 more jobs.
Millari Group Australia this week confirmed it signed a deal to acquire 100% of Juken Gisborne’s New Zealand facilities (JNL) for an undisclosed purchase price and rebrand them as Millari NZ.
Millari, a distributor of True Blue Timber, aims to restart operations at the 35,000m2 factory in a couple of months. It will produce laminated veneer lumber, plywood and timber for the Australian timber industry.
The sawmill stopped production in December 2023 and was fully closed in March 2024.
At the time, Juken NZ Ltd managing director Hiroyuki Kawado explained the company had been unable to turn around ongoing losses from a decline in product demand.
The sawmill opened in 1994 and originally produced a small range of specialised wood products, mainly for the Japanese housing market.
It employed about 70 people when it closed.
The current output capacity of the Millari NZ sawmill is 130,000cu m per year, 60,000cu m is timber, laminated veneer lumber is 55,000cu m and plywood is 15,000cu m.
Millari promises “significant investment” over the next three years to increase the sawmill’s current production capacities.
The production capacity of the sawmill, laminated veneer lumber and plywood is expected to increase to 200,000m3 by 2027. (Timber 100,000m3, laminated veneer lumber 80,000m3 and plywood 20,000m3).
“With the re-opening of the facility by Millari NZ, 100 jobs will be created, with over 500 indirect jobs from the investment back into the community,” a company statement read.
Owner and chief executive Ryan Yari told the Gisborne Herald that Millari was approaching key former staff members from the mill one by one to bring them back on board.
“The feedback so far is great, most of them are happy to come back,” Yari said.
“Our general manager is Shane Wilson, a local who was running the JNL for the last 20 years. He was the first one we re-employed.”
“He knows everything about the mill, he knows everything about the people who worked there.”
Yari said jobs outside the mill will be generated in areas such as transportation, logistics and construction.
He said the mill will need continual maintenance from specialists as Millari planned to run it 24/7, providing more work for locals.
“What we noticed in JNL is that we will continually need outside engineers, technicians, electricians, plumbers, you name it,” he said.
“When I had a look at the JNL list, there was a long list of engineers and technicians around Gisborne.”
The main source of logs for the mill will be from plantations around the Gisborne area.
“What we agreed with JNL is we are going to use their forests because JNL still owns a lot of forests in that area,” Yari said.
“However if we go with someone else, which we haven’t decided yet, all resources are coming from around the Gisborne area.”
He said his company was looking for an opportunity to establish laminated veneer lumber manufacturing in the last few years and the location of the site near Gisborne and Napier ports, nearby access to logging resources and not having to start from scratch with an existing site were factors that played a role in Millari’s decision to buy the site.
When the mill is running, 80% of production will be shipped to Australia while 20% will be kept for the domestic market.
Newly rehired mill manager Shane Wilson is excited about the mill reopening and hopes the community will support it.
“[When the mill shut down] it was the end of an era. I had one hundred thousand feelings when the mill was shutting down,” Wilson said.
Since the mill closed, Wilson said he had taken the chance to travel around the North Island fishing and renovating his house but the call up for his old job was “good timing” as he was looking for new work.
He has 22 years of experience working on the site.
“Initially I’ll be focused on getting these machines up and running again, that is going to be a bit of a process so I am hoping the Gisborne community will match my energy,” he said.
“Most of the positions will be trained positions, entry-level and on-the-job training, and there is going to be a lot of work there.
“I’m going to try my best to keep all business local, i.e. admin stuff.”
Eastland Wood Council chair Julian Kohn said the mill reopening was excellent news.
“It enhances the employment opportunities in the region, through the infrastructure, not only the overall industry.
“It also establishes a degree of confidence in the industry which has unfortunately been sadly lacking in the last few years.”
He said the wood council encouraged environmentally sustainable processing in the region, looked forward to working with the new owners and hoped it would encourage others to start up in the district.
The mill aimed to reduce the Australian timber industry’s dependence on imports from Europe and Asia.
“With a perfect mix of engineered products and solid pine framing, the mill will be an asset best suited to ease the burden on businesses in Australia, which have been forced to rely on imported products due to the lack of local manufacturing,” a Millari statement said.
Purchase settlement is currently expected to occur later this month.
James Pocock joined the Gisborne Herald as chief reporter in 2024 after covering environmental, local government and post-cyclone issues in Hawke’s Bay. He has a keen interest in finding the bigger picture in research and making it more accessible to audiences. He lives near Gisborne. james.pocock@nzme.co.nz.