Border Timbers Limited will remain under judicial management despite posting a profit for the latest quarter.

“Discussions with the government will follow. Accordingly, the company will remain under judicial management for the foreseeable future,” said judicial manager Peter Bailey.

The company was placed under provisional judicial management in January 2015 and went into final judicial management in April 2016 after failing to service debts to several financial institutions.

The timber producer posted a net profit before tax of $70,49 million for the three months to September 30 2020, emerging from a loss-making position of $88,51 million in the prior comparable period.

“The economic environment has been fairly stabilising since the introduction of the foreign currency auction system and this has seen some improvements in the macro-economic fundamentals.

“Generally, global economies experienced the devastating effects of Covid-19 pandemic which resulted in lockdown measures which affected both our local and export markets,” said Bailey.

But the group’s revenue for the quarter under review slipped to $313,14 million from $371,86 million in the same period last year, which management attributed to a dip in sales volumes to 16 707 cubic metres from 18 973 cubic metres in the prior comparative period.

Production volumes went down by 24 percent to 13 668 cubic metres for the period under review from 17 986 cubic metres in the comparative 2019 period.

For transmission poles and lumber, production volumes slumped to 2 130 and 11 539 cubic metres, from a 2019 comparative of 2 621 and 15 365 cubic metres, respectively.

The judicial manager is however optimistic that business will tick up going forward as demand is still high for the company’s products.

“Demand for lumber remains very high both in the local market and the export market, hence a significant positive movement is expected as the economies return to normalcy,” said Bailey.