Background to Pöyry in New Zealand

Pöyry's presence and role in New Zealand has developed over many years through a series of antecedent companies and joint ventures. In 1963 the first manifestation of the firm was J G Groome and Associates.

Forest management in New Zealand at the time saw half of the plantation estate under government ownership and much of the remainder in the hands of vertically integrated forestry companies, who employed their own forest management staff. Groome extended its activities offshore, firstly to Fiji and then further into the Pacific and increasingly in Indonesia and Papua New Guinea.

By the late 1970s and early 1980s there were also a growing number of forestry advisory projects funded by various development agencies. These included the World Bank, Asian Development Bank and New Zealand's own Ministry of External Relations and Trade. Groome and Associates reach was extended by many of these assignments, providing a strong familiarity with South East Asia in particular.

Through this process staff of Groome and Associates came into increasing contact with counterparts from a firm based in Finland, Jaakko Pöyry Oy. The latter was also engaged in consultancy work, but was better recognised for its forestry sector engineering projects.

To key individuals from both companies the fit was compelling. In 1987 a joint venture entity was formed, Groome Pöyry. The new firm now focused on consulting and advisory activities. These were dominated by resource forestry. Then, as now, the New Zealand arm of the company has more forestry graduates than those from other disciplines.

The Pöyry connection provided a pathway to more distant destinations, particularly the plantation growing countries of the Southern Hemisphere and then China. In 1989 the firm's base office relocated to Auckland.

The deregulation of New Zealand's economy in the late 1980s forced resource forestry to become commercially oriented and financially robust. The government chose to privatise the plantations it had grown. Groome Pöyry and its parent, Jaakko Pöyry were involved in the process.

Through the 1990's Groome Pöyry migrated further still into the area of forestry investment analysis. Recognising the increased level of transactions involving timberland, the firm developed and refined its forest valuation activities.

By 1999, Jaakko Pöyry elected to take full ownership of the NZ entity. This coincided with the establishment of the company's Asia Pacific grouping of forest consulting offices.

With the NZ office now approaching 50 years of activity, albeit under a variety of names, we are proud of our claim to expertise in our specialty - resource forestry.