"Discussions have been ongoing with merchants and printers and should conclude shortly," said M-real commercial printing regional sales director Mick Barry.

The price increases come as M-real has issued a profits warning ahead of its 2005 results, driven by the Finnish manufacturer's restructuring costs of 27.5m (40m).

The news is another blow to the producer, which has seen its financial performance impaired by cost-saving programmes and weak market performance.

President and chief executive Hannu Anttila (pictured), who broke the news in a statement to the Helsinki stock exchange, said the firm's Q4 results would be "weaker" than its Q3 performance.

M-real's pre-tax results for 2005 will also be in the red, he said.

This comes as a disappointment to Anttila, who had hoped to return the firm to profitability during 2005.

The paper producer's share price dropped by nearly 4% to 3 on the news.

Out of the 27.5m restructuring costs, 17m is down to the cost-saving and efficiency programme at its Pont Sainte Maxence mill in France.

Some 60 jobs will be cut at the 120,000-tonnes-per-year fine-paper mill, resulting in non-recurring costs of 3m.

The cuts were announced in December last year, due to rising energy costs and falling paper prices.

The assets of the mill, which amount to just over 14m, will be written down.

M-real's end of year results for 2005 will be published on 8 February.