Letter of Intent to sell STORA board mill in Germany

STORA has reached preliminary agreement, in the form of a "letter of intent", regarding the sale of STORA's paperboard mill in Arnsberg, Germany, to Cascades S.A., which is the French subsidiary of the Canadian forest products company, Paperboard Industries International Inc. Final agreement is expected to be reached during July. Operations at the Arnsberg unit, which is part of Stora Paperboard, focus on the production of recycled fiber-based White Lined Chipboard. The mill has an annual total capacity of 135,000 tonnes. "The sale of Arnsberg is part of our work to improve the Group's production structure and further concentrate the focus of our operations. Since Arnsberg is the only STORA Group unit producing recycled fiber-based board, coordination opportunities with the rest of the Group are extremely limited", says Torbjörn Pettersson, President of Stora Paperboard.