Greenpeace to IKEA: Just because it’s legal doesn’t mean it's sustainable

Stockholm/ Bucharest, 11 April 2024 – In response to Greenpeace Central and Eastern Europe’s report published yesterday, “Assemble the truth: Old-growth forest destruction in the Romanian Carpathians”, IKEA is attempting to sow doubt around the findings of the report in international media. Greenpeace finds IKEA’s statements unfortunate and misleading and still hopes IKEA will clean up their supply chain from old-growth forests and become a champion for better forest protection.

Špela Bandelj Ruiz, biodiversity campaigner at Greenpeace CEE, said: “The evidence presented by Greenpeace CEE that IKEA manufacturers, who create some of their most popular products, are linked to old-growth forest destruction in Romania is robust. While it is true that what IKEA is doing is not illegal, it doesn’t mean it’s sustainable, which IKEA is keen on being portrayed as.”

All the logging sites linked with IKEA’s manufacturers visited by Greenpeace CEE were identified as old-growth not only due to their average age as listed in the publicly available forestry management plans, but because of their unique and diverse ecological compositions. All observed forest areas were found by investigators to exhibit clear characteristics of old-growth, including structural complexity and the presence of trees of varying sizes, shapes, and species, as well as the presence of habitat trees, lying and standing deadwood, and the ability to perform numerous ecological ecosystem services. 

As demonstrated by Greenpeace CEE’s recent report, the FSC certification scheme does not always recognise old-growth forests for their true biodiversity value. This, in turn, allows industrial forestry and logging practices under FSC certification, even in forests that should be strictly protected. 

“Hiding behind a certification scheme that is clearly failing to protect old-growth forests, is not the solution. We encourage IKEA to not only clean its supply chains, but publicly advocate and encourage politicians for an effective implementation of the EU’s biodiversity commitments, which should ensure our last remaining and most biodiverse forests are there to remain. This will help IKEA not to get stuck in the problem of being linked to old-growth forest destruction in the future, but instead become a leader on nature protection”, concludes Bandelj Ruiz. 

ENDS

Notes: 

Please find images of yesterday's Greenpeace activities in front of IKEA stores in Sweden, Germany and Czechia on the Greenpeace media library.

Contacts:

Christine Gebeneter, Senior communication strategist at Greenpeace CEE, +43 664 8403807, christine.gebeneter@greenpeace.org

Christopher Engberg Dahl, communications officer at Greenpeace Sweden, +46791421453, christopher.dahl@greenpeace.org

Greenpeace International Press Desk, +31 (0)20 718 2470 (available 24 hours), pressdesk.int@greenpeace.org 

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