In short

A round-up of today's other business stories in brief

Workers are not aware of tax credits

Most workers are not aware of the tax credits available to them, the Irish Taxation Institute said yesterday at the launch of Tax Return Week.

The institute has published six new taxation guides written in plain English and is encouraging workers to log onto its website at www.taxireland.ie. Tax guides will also be launched in Polish, Czech, Slovakian, Latvian and Lithuanian.

The Institute wants self-employed people to organise their tax returns well in advance of the October 31st deadline.

Chief executive Mark Redmond said one out of every eight self-employed people who filed their tax returns electronically in 2005 did so on the last day and that this was causing a bottleneck in the system.

African Eagle set to generate funds

Explortion group African Eagle said yesterday it aims to generate income from its Mkushi copper project in Zambia as soon as possible.

In a statement to the stock exchange, African Eagle said that following an evaluation of its mining portfolio it has decided to focus on the Mkushi project as it is the nearest to commercial production.

The company has started a resource drilling programme at the site and expects a full feasibility study to be complete by the end of 2007.

The company yesterday named Seymour Pierce as broker and nominated advisor.

FBD director buys 10,000 shares

FBD non-executive director Philip Lynch has spent €395,000 buying 10,000 shares in the insurance group. The shares were bought last Friday.

David Went, chief executive of Irish Life & Permanent, yesterday made a paper profit of €217,819 after spending €189,050 to exercise share options. Mr Went bought 20,549 shares at €9.20 each. Irish Life & Permanent shares closed unchanged at €19.80 last night.

Oil field on target for Petrel group

Petrel, the Dublin-based, AIM listed resource group, has said its Subb and Luhais oil field project is moving ahead.

A joint venture with a local partner is in place, a letter of credit has been opened and activated, and "no insuperable security problems" have been encountered.

Bird flu may cost insurers €29bn

A bird flu pandemic could cost European life insurers as much as 29 billion in extra claims and US insurers about $18 billion (€15 billion), a report said yesterday.

These payouts would likely be tolerable for the life insurance industry; and as long as an outbreak were temporary, the companies' credit quality would not likely change, but profitability could be hurt, the report from Fitch Ratings said.

A deadly bird flu virus has spread into Europe but so far the virus mainly affects birds.The International Monetary Fund has warned that the flu could hurt the economy globally.

Among insurers, life insurers would likely be hardest hit by the bird flu, Fitch said.

But a substantial part of the risk of life insurance payouts would likely be borne by reinsurance companies, which provide insurance to insurers.

The ratings agency estimated that 400,000 bird flu deaths could occur in Europe and 209,000 in the United States. But an outbreak of the disease could increase demand for life insurance, which could mitigate losses from deaths, Fitch said.