Audit

According to the Articles of Association, UPM has one auditor which shall be a firm of authorised public accountants, whose lead audit partner is an authorised public accountant (KHT). The Annual General Meeting elects the auditor and resolves on the auditor’s remuneration. The Board of Directors’ Audit Committee prepares the Board's proposal to the AGM for the company’s auditor and for the auditor's remuneration and recommends to the Board the election of the auditor.

The AGM 2019 re-elected PricewaterhouseCoopers Oy, a firm of authorised public accountants, as the company’s auditor with Authorised Public Accountant (KHT) Mikko Nieminen as the lead audit partner succeeding KHT Merja Lindh who held this position since 8 April 2014. The AGM further resolved that the audit fee will be paid against invoices approved by the Board of Directors’ Audit Committee.

The Audit Committee evaluates the auditor’s independence, audit and services annually. In addition, the Audit Committee arranges audit tendering processes at regular intervals. The auditor’s term of office covers the company’s financial period (calendar year) and ends at the closing of the AGM following the election. As a rule, the audit firm elected by UPM’s AGM performs the audit of the company’s Finnish subsidiaries as well, and audit firms belonging to the same chain with it audit the company's other subsidiaries.

The auditor provides UPM’s shareholders with the statutory Auditor’s Report in connection with the financial statements and reports on its audit findings to the Board of Directors and to the Audit Committee semiannually or quarterly, respectively.

The Audit Committee reviews the auditor’s annual audit plan and approves the framework for the fees related to audit and non-audit services. The auditor reports on its audit procedures and non-audit services and incurred fees to the committee quarterly. The committee reviews the related invoices and, if they are in line with the audit plan and within the agreed framework, approves them.​