Greenpeace Romania protests at IKEA over alleged links to Carpathian forest logging

Greenpeace Romania activists staged a peaceful protest outside the IKEA Pallady store in Bucharest on Tuesday, October 13, placing sawdust and sections of tree trunks at the entrance. The demonstration coincided with the release of an investigation into logging in Romania’s Poiana Ruscă Mountains and a separate Greenpeace Nordic report on IKEA’s forest policies.

Greenpeace said its investigation also focused on Plot 37 in the Natura 2000 site ROSCI0219, a centuries-old forest that had appeared on a list of areas proposed for strict protection under the EU’s 10% biodiversity target.

According to the organization, the forest was clear-cut before receiving protected status and subsequently disappeared from the map of areas eligible for strict protection. Greenpeace also alleged that official timber transport records showed the wood reached an intermediary storage facility that supplies a factory operated by a key IKEA supplier.

“The case in Rusca Montană provides clear evidence from the field: a forest proposed for strict protection was clear-cut before the law could save it, and the timber most likely went to factories producing furniture for IKEA,” said Valentin Sălăgeanu, forests and biodiversity campaign coordinator at Greenpeace Romania.

Greenpeace said roads had been cut into steep slopes, a stream bed had been used to transport timber, and no habitat trees or deadwood remained on the site.

The organization called on IKEA to stop sourcing wood from forests proposed for strict protection and remove an exception in its IWAY sourcing rules that allows purchases from high-conservation-value forests when they are certified by the Forest Stewardship Council. It also urged the Romanian government and Environment Ministry to impose a moratorium on logging across 1.9 million hectares mapped for possible strict protection under the country’s National Recovery and Resilience Plan.

The non-profit said IKEA received the investigation before publication and disputed its conclusions. Inter IKEA Group said the logging in Plot 37 had been legally authorized under an approved forest management plan in a Natura 2000 area and described the photographic evidence as an unrepresentative snapshot.