Danish furniture company to launch 11 million euro factory in Rivne

Danish furniture producer Hjort Knudsen has pledged to build an 11 million euro production plant in Ukraine.

The firm plans to build the plant on the outskirts of Rivne, a city of 243,000 residents located 320 kilometers west of Kyiv and a three-hour drive from the Polish border, the Rivne Oblast Administration stated on its website on Oct. 16.

The factory will cover a territory of 40,000 square meters in Rivne Oblast and will bring 1,000 new jobs to the area. At the workshop, Hjort Knudsen will establish eco-friendly production.

The company hasn’t specified whether it will be collecting recyclable materials from across Ukraine or will reuse surplus raw materials that usually go to waste during the production of furniture.

“Another powerful investor is entering Rivne,” Vitaliy Koval, head of the Rivne Oblast Administration, said in the Oct. 16 statement. “It will be a large woodworking enterprise. It is important that environmentally friendly manufacturing of value-added products will be established.”

The Danish company evaluated the business environment, economic prospects and logistics network in Rivne Oblast for a year before it made the decision to build the factory, according to Serhiy Hemberg, deputy head of the Rivne Oblast Administration.

Koval, in turn, believes that this investment means that Rivne Oblast is good for running a business and more international investors may want to put their money in Ukraine.

Currently, the furniture company has four branches in Ukraine: in Lviv, Pochaiv, Velyki Mosty and Brody. In Europe, including Ukraine, it employs 2,000 people, according to the Facebook page of Hjort Knudsen Ukraine.

Founded in 1973, Hjort Knudsen produces and exports furniture to more than 11 European countries, including Sweden, Germany and Switzerland.