Mill to be sold

Waimarino Bulletin, Volume 6, Issue 249, 5 July 1988, Page 1

Mill to be sold

Karioi pulp mill will be sold as a going concem if current negotiations to sell the mill to an Asian consortium are successful.

Directing Manager Klas Kronqvist said last week the negotiations were well advanced and that the consortium would be buying the mill to produce pulp, but that the mill needed

to be more efficient. He said it was too early to see what sort of measures the new owners would adopt to ensure greater efficiency. The mill has not been

consistently profitable since it was built by Winstone and Samsung Industries as a joint venture. Mr Kronqvist said there was presently a world shortage of fibre, or pulp, and that the Asian concerns wanted pulp. The decision to sell the mill by Fletcher

Challenge Ltd comes after a review of a number of options for the future of the mill. Karioi pulp mill is owned by Winstone Ltd which is now a subsidiary of Fletcher Challenge. It was a wholly owned subsidiary of Brierley Investments Limited. The mill produces

120,000 tonnes of pulp per year for Asian producers of paperboard, fine papers and newsprint. A chemicalthermo mechanical process is used at Karioi. Mr Kronqvist said he had confidence in the future of the mill.