The Central Union of Agricultural and Forestry Owners MTK denies threatening to bring timber sales to a halt next week. Government plans to introduce new measures that would cut the benefit forestry owners receive from tax reliefs on timber income. The newspapers Turun Sanomat and Väli-Suomen Sanomat reported that the MTK was planning to bring timber trade to a standstill over the matter. MTK forest owner Antti Sahi says the union has encouraged forest owners to wait for a resolution to the taxation issue. However he says each landowner is entitled to make trading decisions individually. MTK has accused government of reneging on a promise to ease up taxes on sales of timber. MTK Branch Manager Pekka Airaksinen described as incomprehensible statements by Finance Minister Jyrki Katainen that the forestry landowners would only be entitled to half of proposed reduction limits. The domestic trade in timber picked up at the end of July when government announced that it would halve taxes on timber sales until 2010. YLE
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