§ Mr. BlizzardTo ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what percentage of UK marine dredged aggregate is exported to(a) Holland and (b) other EU countries. [133253]
§ Mr. Mike O'BrienThe information is not collected in the form requested. However, in the year ending June 2003—the latest quarter for which data are available—sales of sand and gravel in Great Britain amounted to 83,318,000 tonnes, of which 12,451,000 tonnes were marine dredged. Exports of sand to the EU totalled 232,000 tonnes over the same period, or slightly less that 0.3 per cent of the total, of which none was exported to the Netherlands. A further 121,000 tonnes were imported, a proportion of which may have been reexported. It is not possible to identify exports of sand by source, i.e. whether they were obtained from marine dredging or were land won.