History of the company

The privatization process of state owned companies was started actively in the first half of the 1990's. Many of the companies could not survive in the market economy conditions and went bankrupt. Nowadays these premises are managed either by companies that are not connected with the previous sphere of activity or, as it can be observed in Riga, by various supermarkets. However, some of the companies were able to develop and adapt, carrying on their businesses. Among these examples is the current joint stock company "Saldus Mežrūpniecība".  In August 21, 1994 a decision was made to give eight forest industry economies to privatization, including Saldus MRS. An international tender was announced; foreigners were interested in the privatization of the former state's economy, however, in the long run, they did not take part in the process. After a year the privatization process came to an end. The company "Saldus Mežrūpniecība" had about 197 000 Ls tax debt, year returns/ turnover was 440 000 Ls. Since the economic showings were improving after the privatization, Ministry of Finance and municipalities agreed to the tax debt capitalization and "Saldus Mežrūpniecība" became Joint Stock Company.

During ten years of existence six closed issues have happened. The last one took place in 2001 when independent auditors evaluated two companies, Joint Stock Company "Saldus Mežrūpniecība" and „Kūrlande Ltd.. Since they are both situated in the territory of former Saldus MRS, the companies joined together, retaining the name of joint stock company "Saldus Mežrūpniecība". After the reorganization, the monetary resources of the company increased. As a result, the company managed to attract considerable credit resources and to build a new sawmill in Saldus, Kuldīgas street 86a, which started its business in November, 2002. The sawmill in Kuldīgas 86a has modern equipment made in Sweden. 10 % in the company's production market comprise export and 90 % - internal market, which are basically long-term cooperation relations.

Investments are being made in the production; as a result turnover has increased from 0, 64 millions to 11.85 millions per year.