Matfors, Sweden

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Matfors is a locality situated in Sundsvall Municipality, Västernorrland County, Sweden with 3,201 inhabitants in 2010.The river Ljungan runs through Matfors. It is situated about 15 kilometers west of Sundsvall, a city with about 45,000 inhabitants. In Matfors there are two schools: Sköle Skola and Matfors Skola, both sharing the same school yard.Matfors is said to have got its name from the rich supply of salmon (Swedish: lax) in the river Ljungan, by which the town was built. The name Matfors consists of two parts: mat (food) and fors (river stream).Matfors was for some time its own community/municipality (Swedish: kommun) but then first merged with Attmar and later Sundsvall (beginning of the 1970s). The town of Matfors was for a long time of less importance than the town of Lucksta in the two adjacent parishes of Attmar and Tuna, until the Matfors-bridge was built across the river Ljungan. Later on a sawmill and a papermill were built together with several other minor industries which increased the town's importance towards dominating the area.The papermill was closed in 1990, at the time owned by SCA, and the original main building now hosts about 20 small businesses. The Matfors area as a whole is home to many small businesses, but many residents also commute to the neighbouring town of Sundsvall. A mid-sized business located in Matfors is SBL Vaccin, a subsidiary of Active Biotech.