Ahlstrom-Munksjö and Metsä Fibre have started safety collaboration by auditing each other’s production facilities. This is a unique form of collaboration among the pulp and paper industry with the target of promoting the safety work within the industry.

“We see that safety has no boundaries, and therefore we want to learn from our partners, and in return, share our own best practices and learnings with our customers, supplier and business partners,” states Camilla Wikström, SVP, Production, Pulp Business, Metsä Fibre.

The program, which started in late 2018, has now its first takeaways. Both companies have paid a lot of attention to safety and especially into preventative actions and trainings. Metsä Fibre has an excellent safety reporting system, which helps safety managers in reporting and following issues to be solved. Ahlstrom-Munksjö has a case distribution method which allows all safety managers to get the most recent information on possible safety issues.

“For Ahlstrom-Munksjö it is important that our pulp suppliers, like Metsä Fibre, meet the high safety standards and contribute to the work safety in the entire supply chain,” says Rune Årnes, VP Health & Safety, Ahlstrom-Munksjö.

Thus far the companies have cross-audited five production sites: two from Ahlstrom-Munksjö and three from Metsä Fibre. The target is to continue the cross-audit program and the companies have agreed on two new audits which will take place in Germany later in the year.

In addition to cross-audits Metsä Group and Ahlstrom-Munksjö are collaborating in RISI PPI awards. The companies are sole sponsors of a new RISI PPI Safety Awards category. The Safety Leadership Award will be conferred in March 2019 for the first time. The target for the new safety award is to recognize a pulp or paper production plant for their consistent management and meritorious commitment to occupational safety, long term performance and to encourage their continuous improvement within safety.