Page 29 from: November 2015

27November 2015

From the inside, America Chung Nam (ACN) Europe’s headquarters at Rotterdam in the
Netherlands looks far from an average corporate
office building. There is ceiling to floor glass
instead of the plaster walls you normally find
between the various rooms. According to the
company’s executive managing director Wade
Schuetzeberg, there’s a clear reason for this trans-
parency. ‘When we moved into this building, it
was one big empty space which we had a free
choice of how to convert and furnish,’ he explains.
‘We decided to keep it spacious and open. It is
good to get a feeling of what’s going on. Besides,
we have got nothing to hide; what you see is what
you get.’
Schuetzeberg also created a large yoga room for
ACN’s 50-plus employees. ‘In life, it’s all about
balance – whether it is your personal life or work
and business,’ he says. ‘Yoga can be a good tool
in helping find that balance.’
In the year 2000, Wade Schuetzeberg arrived in
the Netherlands from the USA. A backpack and a
train ticket were all he carried. His mission was to
build a paper for recycling collection and trading
company that would supply the Nine Dragons
Paper mills in China. He had to start from scratch;
there was no office, no network, nothing. ‘On the
train from Schiphol Airport to Rotterdam, I
passed Van den Born Papier Recycling in Delft,’
he recalls. ‘I decided to give them a call the next
day, and so they became one of our first suppliers.’
The rest, as they say, is history. Over the past 15
years, ACN (Europe) has rapidly expanded its
business throughout the continent and has
become the market leader in terms of the procure-
ment and export of recovered paper. More than 3
million tonnes of paper and plastics for recycling
will be exported by ACN (Europe) in 2015.
Recently, the company celebrated shipment of
its one millionth container from the port of Rot-
terdam to the Far East. ‘Over 15 years, to achieve
the milestone of one million containers is a great
success – not only for ACN (Europe) but also
for the suppliers and customers we serve,’
underlines Schuetzeberg. ‘It is proof that we
have a good business model and that our con-
tribution of exports towards the sustainability
of recycling paper is solid.’

What does a million containers look
like?
‘If you were to make a back-to-back row of all
the containers shipped, this would have the
length of the tourist car route from our office in
Rotterdam to the Dongguan Nine Dragon Paper
mills in the south of China. That is a 150-hour
car drive with on side only containers. One mil-
lion containers is roughly equivalent to 23 mil-
lion tonnes of recovered paper, saving more
than 430 million trees, 600 million cubic metres
of water, 229 million barrels of oil and 101 mil-
lion megawatts of energy.’

Was there reason to celebrate given
that China’s economy has slowed down
and affected its demand for recovered
paper?
‘The recent deceleration of growth is a normal
economic occurrence. All markets adjust. We
saw that in 1990-92 when I graduated and start-
ed in the business; in 1997 during the Asian flu/
Asian economic crisis; and again in 2008 during
the Great Recession. When you look at recov-
ered paper demand globally, we as an industry
are still on a very strong foundation. The
demand for recovered paper has not weakened,
but the shift in demand has caused the supply
lines to be altered towards different sources. In
fact, in Europe, ACN has seen more than 20%
growth in demand for our product to China due
to the correction of the Euro against the US
dollar since October 2014.’

In the long term, what do you expect
will be the effect of what is currently
happening in China?
‘As the second largest economy in the world,
China’s contribution towards global growth is
still significant, even if not at a double-digit rate.
The reason for slower growth has been well estab-
lished – to sustain a healthier economy overall,
establish better environmental standards, and
provide necessary reforms. All developing econ-
omies have had to make their way through these
challenges. The difference is that China is doing
this on a much shorter timescale with a far great-
er populace and geography compared to Europe

or the US. The success story is still there, but a
consolidation phase is under way.’

As an exporting business, how do you
make the best out of this consolidation
phase?
‘Strong management and production efficiency
is vital during this period. Knowing your busi-
ness partners in China is going to be paramount.
China will come out of this period even strong-
er and is still expected to become the world’s
largest economy in this next generation. Think
beyond the current economic cycle and focus
on fundamentals. With the largest growing mid-
dle class in the world, where do you think
growth opportunities will lie?’

Given that China is producing more and
more fibres locally, how will this affect
volumes imported from Europe and the
USA?
‘Import volumes have been balanced by increas-
ing domestic collection. This is a normal prod-
uct of a growing domestic economy. I see this
as a positive development, reducing larger fluc-
tuations/volatility in pricing. We can see that in
the banded ranges in which recovered paper has
traded over the last several years.’

Boosted by China’s Green Fence qual-
ity controls, how has the quality issue
influenced the paper recycling industry?
‘Quality is the first and last discussion we have
in terms of selecting suppliers. Green Fence
solidified the minimum standards that the
industry needs to adhere to – regardless of the
country of origin. Without Green Fence, we
wouldn’t have seen the necessary improvements
in selection and sortation that are required to
make sustainable recycling programmes. This
benefits domestic and export consumers alike.
The improved quality has forced the implemen-
tation of better sortation and quality control
back down the supply chain to the municipali-
ties and commercial/industrial producers of
waste paper. Only until processed through a
qualified sortation plant (MRF or paper mer-
chant) does waste paper become a product –

Wade Schuetzeberg of recovered paper exporter ACN (Europe):

‘Nothing is bought until something is sold’