Greenpeace Takes Carpathian Logging Row to IKEA's Doorstep in Bucharest

Greenpeace Romania activists staged a peaceful protest on Tuesday, 13 October, outside the IKEA Pallady store in Bucharest, scattering sawdust and sections of tree trunks across the entrance. The action coincided with the release of a Greenpeace investigation into logging in Romania's Poiana Ruscă Mountains and a separate Greenpeace Nordic report on IKEA's forest policies, as reported by Romania Insider.

The investigation centres on Plot 37 in the Natura 2000 site ROSCI0219, described as a centuries-old forest. Greenpeace says the plot was clear-cut even though it appeared on a list of areas proposed for strict protection under the European Union's target of safeguarding 10 percent of its land. The organisation alleges that timber from the felled plot may have entered the supply chain of a key IKEA supplier. The report as covered does not name the supplier, and it gives no figures for the size of the area or the volume of wood involved, so the allegation remains a claim about possible links rather than a confirmed chain of custody.

IKEA has rejected the allegations. The company says the logging took place in an area designated for timber production, which is neither classified as virgin or old-growth forest nor included in Romania's national catalogue of virgin and semi-virgin forests. It points out that the map Greenpeace relied on shows proposed areas that are still under evaluation, not finalised protection, and that a proposal for future protection does not by itself create binding legal or certification-based restrictions. IKEA states that the harvest complied with Romanian law and with the applicable Forest Stewardship Council and conservation requirements.

The retailer also describes what it did once questions were raised. It says it acted under its established due diligence processes, reviewed the harvesting practices, sent forestry experts to the site and consulted the supplier, the local forest district and the FSC. It adds that it will monitor the site to make sure a new forest is established.

The disagreement turns on a gap that sustainability practitioners will recognise. One side measures compliance against what is legally and contractually binding today, the other against what scientists and policymakers have flagged as worth protecting tomorrow. A forest can be lawfully harvested and certified while still sitting on a list of places the EU wants to leave standing. For Romania, which holds some of the continent's last large tracts of near-natural woodland, that tension is not abstract. The country's Carpathian forests store carbon, shelter rare species and regulate water, and decisions taken plot by plot add up quickly.

For companies, the episode illustrates how due diligence is judged in practice. Certification and legal compliance are necessary, yet campaigners and increasingly regulators ask whether a buyer anticipated where protection was heading and whether traceability reaches all the way back to the stump. Retailers sourcing wood in Europe can expect that question to be asked more often as the EU's biodiversity and deforestation-related rules bed in.

The facts that would settle the matter, including the supplier's identity, the exact boundaries of the plot and the route the timber took, were not set out in the coverage. Until they are, readers have two competing accounts that both rest on real documents and real definitions, which is why the story deserves following.

Why it matters

Romania's Carpathian forests are among the last large near-natural woodlands in Europe, so each contested plot carries weight for carbon storage, wildlife and water. When a global retailer's supply chain is questioned, it tests whether certification such as FSC and supplier due diligence can reach all the way back to the stump. Exereco readers working on ESG reporting should watch how traceability claims hold up under this kind of scrutiny.