Community

• Nicaragua is the second poorest country in the hemisphere and the RAAN leads the nation in unemployment rate.
• Felix destroyed roads, bridges, schools, hundreds of small businesses and thousands of homes.
• MSSA's hurricane wood project today employs more than 70 local citizens and projects employment of 200 or more when extraction resumes in 2009.
• MSSA has already constructed more than 12 kilometers of new road allowing residents road access to their homes and land for the first time.
• MSSA has assumed primary responsibility for maintenance of certain secondary roads and bridges that provide the only access for local communities in the region.
• MSSA is harvesting in partnership with local residents. Each PAF includes reforestation of indigenous species and marketable hardwoods that will allow our partners to convert their land use from subsistence agriculture to sustainable forestry, the most economic use of the RAAN.
• MSSA's hurricane wood project has contributed to the local tax base in 2008 and will produce significant local tax revenues in the future.
• MSSA is committed to pro-active community contribution, a tenet of the Company's mission. MSSA intends to conduct feasibility studies on biomass power generation, the economic use of wood unsuitable for lumber, and community solar power sources. MSSA intends to work with local leaders to offer wood and labor for home repair and educational programs, including reading and basic forestry.