UPDATE 1-St Gobain Q1 sales fall on dollar, sees new job cuts

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By Marie Maitre

PARIS, April 22 (Reuters) - Saint-Gobain (SGOB.PA: Quote, Profile, Research) reported lower first-quarter sales on Tuesday, hit by a weaker dollar and an unfavourable year-on-year comparison, but stuck to its 2008 earnings growth targets.

The world's biggest building materials maker also announced new job cuts while confirming 2008 targets for "modest" growth in operating profit at constant exchange rates and in recurring net income -- excluding capital gains, asset writedowns and flat glass fines.

"The group is confident in its ability to adapt and withstand more challenging economic conditions and therefore confirms its objectives for 2008," Chief Executive Pierre Andre de Chalendar told a conference call.

Saint-Gobain said it would achieve its full-year financial targets thanks to its strategy of refocusing its business on housing-related activities, increasing its exposure emerging markets, as well as stricter cost controls.

"We have already decided a number of additional measures to adapt our business in difficult areas, particularly Spain, Britain and most of all the United States," de Chalendar said.

"This will bear fruits that will come on top of the 300 million euros of cost savings that I had announced last summer," he said, adding this would mean another 800 job cuts in the United States, on top of 1,700 cuts already announced in 2007.

Chalendar said 400 jobs had been cut by attrition in Britain in the first quarter of the year.