PALM Paper's £400 million mill will boost West Norfolk's economy and jobs figures as well as having an impact on its skyline.
The owner of the German company, in Lynn this week to check progress on the project, promised that the project is safe from the current financial turmoil and has short and long-term benefits for the area.
Dr Wolfgang Palm said that more than 90 pe
r cent of the workforce who will operate the mill will be local people and will have safe long-term jobs.
Around 1,000 workers will be on site early next year installing the giant machinery and, although most of them will be coming here from Germany, they will be looking for accommodation and spending money in local shops and amenities.
Lynn Port is profiting with 70,000 tonnes of prefabricated concrete sections currently being shipped from Germany via the docks and once the plant is running, there will be jobs for related industry including haulage and recycling.
The recruitment drive is already well under way and Mr Palm said that they were managing to find "very nice, very motivated people with good skills."
The first 37 to be appointed have started their training which involves time at the Palm mill in Germany. These are the prospective shift leaders who will run the machines with back-up from a German support team for the first two or three years.
Recruitment will continue until next summer.
Mr Palm said that the scheme – currently the second largest construction project in the UK – is a little ahead of schedule and there will be a topping-out ceremony on the main building on Thursday, December 11.
He apologised to people, especially those in South Lynn, who have been disturbed by noise and vibrations while 12,000 piles were hammered into the soil to provide strong foundations for the heavy buildings and machinery. "The noisiest piling will be finished next week and it will all be finished by the end of the month," he said.
The main buildings should be completed in January and installation of the giant machinery will start in January 2009 with parts coming in from Germany, Brazil and Finland.
"We are about two weeks ahead of schedule at this point and still on target to start up as planned in September 2009," said Mr Palm who makes visits to Lynn every four weeks.
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