Mr. Donal Magner:

As a marketing ploy, it sells long-term supplies to the board mills in Ireland, that is Clonmel and Waterford Medite which it now owns but it always supplied them even when it did not own them. In fairness, Coillte is getting a premium for its logs. When I worked with the Irish Timber Council years ago, when price was no longer as issue, I saw that the big fear that saw mills have is continuity of supply. One of the major benefits is that Coillte has given commitments to the market in the United Kingdom, to which it is exporting virtually all of its product. If Coillte does not honour its commitment, it will fall out of the market and people will lose faith in the company. In fairness to Coillte, during good times and bad times, it has kept the flow of timber to the saw milling sector and has not withheld it. One of the fears is that the company which buys the company may decide that if the price of timber does not reach €60 per cu. m it will hold the product back and will wait until the price rises. That is all fine in short-term planning but in long-term planning it would destroy a number of saw mills.