A timber recycling firm which operates as a social enterpise has reported growing turnover and staff numbers, despite the recession.

Oxford Wood Recycling based at Milton Park, near Didcot, has seen its turnover to September 30 rise by 20 per cent to £125,000 and has recorded a pre-tax profit of £10,000.

The company, which now employs nine people from disadvantaged backgrounds, specialises in collecting, recycling and re-selling timber from clients in the manufacturing and building trade.

The year also saw the proportion of waste material that is reused rise to almost to nearly 20 per cent of the 1,000 tonnes collected with just three per cent sent to landfill.

The firm that receives virtually no grant aid, recently set up a partnership with the Pathway Workshop in Blackbird Leys, Oxford, which takes on unemployed young people in a workshop producing kindling and garden furniture.

As well as supplying the project with waste wood, Oxford Wood Recycling is now distributing kindling for re-sale in smaller local outlets.

Director Helen Porter said: “The growth is there and we are sustaining it and thinking carefully about how to develop the business further.”