Stora Enso is restructuring production to improve profitability by building a 400,000-tonnes-per-year newsprint/supercalendered paper machine - but it will close two others.


Construction of the 271m (E430m) machine at Langerbrugge in Belgium will start as soon as possible, with start-up planned for late 2002.


The paper machine will mainly use recovered paper from the surrounding region, and its main target market will be Western Europe.


But once the new machine is in operation, Stora will shut PM2 at Langerbrugge, taking out 120,000 tonnes of SC paper, and PM1 at Summa in Finland, which produces 110,000 tonnes of newsprint. 200 jobs will go at Summa.


Chief executive Jukka Hrml said the programme would have an "insignificant effect" on the newsprint market balance. Stora will be prepared to take downtime if necessary.


Hrml said the industry needed to improve its asset structure as well as consolidate. Stora will make a decision by the end of February on a 12.6m investment to improve efficiency at Summa.


And 160 jobs will go in February when it closes an off-line coating machine at its Nymlla fine paper mill in Sweden. Nymlla will concentrate its 400,000 tonnes annual capacity specifically on uncoated fine paper, moving away from silk and gloss coated stock.


Story by Andy Scott