Seanad Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 15 Nov 2022

I am delighted to have the opportunity to address fellow Senators on the important topic of forestry. I thank them for the invitation. It is timely that I bring forestry matters to the House, especially in light of the current focus on climate change, with COP27 now into its second week, and the urgent need for climate action.

It is well recognised that planting trees is one of the most efficient methods at our disposal to reduce carbon emissions and that forests have a vital role to play in helping us to address the climate crisis and global warming. The sustainable management of forests can also increase carbon sequestration and produces renewable wood products that act as carbon stores. Forests offer multifunctional benefits. They improve the environment not only in terms of climate change mitigation but also by enhancing biodiversity and water quality. They also contribute to the rural economy and provide health-enhancing recreational spaces for the enjoyment of all.

In order to increase tree planting and the sustainable management of forests, however, we must incentivise farmers and other landowners to so do. After all, the planting of trees is a permanent land use change. That is why I am so pleased to have recently secured funding of more than €1.3 billion for forestry. This will fund the new forestry programme from 2023-27, as well as continued premium payments to current forest owners. This €1.3 billion package is a vote of confidence in farmers, landowners, forest owners, nurseries, sawmills, public bodies and communities and, indeed, all other stakeholders in forestry. This comprehensive package increases premiums by between 46% and 66%, depending on the forest type. I sought these levels of increase because I believe them necessary to attract the level of interest we need to see in our afforestation schemes. It is my belief that the package will help to reverse the recent trend away from tree planting. The new programme will align with our ambition to reach 8,000 ha of new planting per year.

We know from extensive consultation across society that people wish to see more trees, would like greater diversity in our forests and very much value access to them.

These insights have certainly informed the development of our shared national vision and, in turn, our draft forest strategy and forestry programme. It is worth repeating our shared vision which captures our ambitions for forestry into the future. We want the right tree in the right place, for the right reasons and with the right management, to support a sustainable and thriving economy and society, and a healthy environment.

It is clear from the extensive public consultation we have carried out over the past year that the public wishes to see more diverse forests. The table of proposed grant rates and premiums that we have published shows a substantial increase in all broadleaf and diverse forest types. This a clear commitment by Government to encourage landowners to plant more diverse forests. In line with this thinking, Members will have seen that we proposed in the draft forestry programme to increase the minimum percentage of new broadleaf trees we wish to see planted to at least 35%. It is important to stress that this figure is simply an early indicative estimate of uptake based on past planting practices.

Members will note from the breakdown of the proposed grant and premium rates for the various forest types that Government has very clearly sought to incentivise the planting of native broadleafs and more diverse forest types. If farmers and landowners seek to take up these measures in greater numbers than have been estimated in the draft programme, my Department will continue to issue approvals for those forest types, provided all other conditions required for a licence to be granted are met. We have also put forward a new forests-for-water measure and we aim to encourage closer-to-nature forestry with an expanded continuous-cover forestry initiative. Furthermore, we wish to incentivise forest owners to deliver enhanced ecosystem services and to encourage reforestation that encompasses species diversity.

Positive farmer engagement will be critical to the success of the next forestry programme. I am very excited therefore by the potential for the new 1 ha native tree area scheme to be a viable option for large numbers of farmers to diversify their income, as well as an entry point for engaging with forestry. As Senators will recall from the time the relevant legislation passed through the House, farmers will not need to apply for a licence in order to avail of the scheme but, of course, they will have to meet the environmental safeguards that will form part of the scheme. I am confident the new scheme will bring new applicants into forestry and encourage those who already have trees to add more.

Also of particular interest to farmers will be the move from the standard 15-year premium to a 20-year premium. The change was sought by farming organisations and I am glad to deliver on it, as we will only achieve our ambitious forestry targets with our farmers on board. We will of course continue to support and incentivise productive forestry which is the bedrock of the forestry industry and supports rural jobs and the rural economy.

Earlier today, I spoke in this Chamber about the need to move to far greater levels of timber-based construction, and productive soft woods will be key to this. Clearly, there have been issues in the past with monoculture plantations which is why we are proposing to move to a position where Sitka spruce plantations will have a minimum broadleaf content of 20% on top of 15% space for nature.

All of these proposals are laid out in the draft forestry programme which is part of the implementation plan for the new forest strategy. Both the programme and the strategy are currently open to public consultation until 29 November. I strongly encourage all interested parties to engage with the consultation in advance of the finalisation of the strategy and programme. The new programme will very much depend on a well-functioning licensing and approvals system and we have been working hard on delivering such a system.

As is well known and, indeed, I have spoken to Members on this matter before, when I first took office we were faced with serious issues following a succession of EU and Irish court decisions in the complexity of the licensing environment and the requirement to meet exacting environmental standards. My Department and I have addressed these issues robustly and have taken a number of steps to resolve them. There has been considerable investment in resources with additional ecologists and forestry inspectors and additional administrative staff assigned to licensing. Furthermore, we have introduced efficiencies to the process and system which have helped streamline delivery. We remain firmly committed to continual improvement to achieve all possible gains in efficiency.

Important work undertaken this year was the expert independent legal and regulatory review of forestry licensing carried out by Philip Lee solicitors.

Following extensive stakeholder engagement, its report was published in June and it reaffirmed the requirement under Irish and EU environmental law for a robust licensing system as well as making a number of recommendations in areas where further efficiencies and streamlining could be achieved within the existing system. The project board for Project Woodland has responded to these recommendations and my Department will now finalise a plan for the implementation of the report.

The positive impacts of the steps we have taken to tackle previous backlogs in licensing can be seen in the increase in the number of licences issued. We have issued over 4,000 licences to date this year. The pace of processing has picked up significantly. We are issuing nearly 30% more licences than applications received and this means that the backlog continues to drop with faster turnaround times for new applicants. To give Members an idea of the progress we have made, the backlog has reduced from 6,000 in August 2021, to 3,700 in January of this year and now stands at 1,606. This means that while we still have work to do, we are moving in the right direction and a great deal has been achieved.

I am pleased to say that this year will be a record year for roads and timber volumes licensed. A total of 266 km of forest roads have been approved, which is already the highest on record for any given year. The volume of felling licences issued year-to-date is impressive at 8.4 million cu. m. This is in the context of the COFORD forecast for harvesting this year of just over 4.5 million cu. m. In terms of afforestation, we have issued 621 licences this year and we are prioritising the further clearance of afforestation files in the coming weeks. We intend to maintain the momentum in terms of issuing forestry licences but what we really need now are more applications. How do we persuade farmers of the benefits of forestry and get them to apply? I believe this new programme offers the opportunity to promote the benefits of forestry and I would ask all those interested in forestry to advocate for more planting.

We have reached a major milestone in securing funding for an ambitious programme but we are not fully there yet. We are engaging with the European Commission now to secure the state aid approval for the programme. This will be an intensive process and I will be keeping stakeholders updated as it proceeds. I believe we are on the cusp of a new and exciting era for forestry in Ireland and my mission now is to bring people on this journey with us. I thank Members for listening. I look forward to hearing their views and feedback and I am happy to answer any questions they may have.

I also welcome the recent announcement by the Minister of State, the Minister and the Taoiseach of the €1.318 billion investment in the forestry programme and many of the concepts therein. I am a member of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine, which has deliberated on the forestry sector too many times to mention. I know our focus was mainly on the backlog in licensing. I welcome the numbers given by the Minister of State and the fact that there has been some alleviation of the problem but we are still not out of the woods, if she will pardon the pun.

The forestry sector has an enormous role to play in our environmental, climate and biodiversity challenges. We have not come anywhere close to harnessing the potential therein because of the aforementioned issues and problems. Hopefully, this new forestry programme will go a long way towards getting things back on track albeit that the programme is still out for public consultation and by virtue of the fact the moneys mentioned are from the Exchequer, we must still get approval from the Commission under state aid rules.

Hopefully, when all those bridges have been crossed, we will then be up and running in what will hopefully turn the entire sector around. I also welcome the initiative announced by the Minister of State for agri-forestry where a farmer can sow up to 1 ha without having to apply for a licence.

I still have some queries about the entire licensing system and process. I do not want to be negative because I welcome the proposal and I know it is a move in the right direction, particularly the increase in premium by anything from 46% to 66% and the extension of premium payment from 15 to 20 years.

All of this is to be welcomed. If people buy into the programme, as we want them to, then the first problem we must address, and this was mentioned by the Minister of State herself, is regaining confidence in the sector. I refer specifically to the farming community. The debacle of the last several years has meant that people who have had issues with licences being caught up in the system have moved on and done something else. From observing their problems, other people have now decided it is not worth the hassle, that they will not go near forestry and that it is impossible to do so. These are facts and I am not fabricating them. They are facts we must address and turn around.

How we do this is going to be a major issue. The question is how this sector can be resold in its new clothes to people who may and, hopefully, will invest in it. This is going to be a major issue for the Minister of State's Department, all the associated bodies and people with vested interests. The current lack of confidence in the sector will need to be reversed. We must work on this aspect from the word "Go". As the Minister of State is aware, the joint committee published a report in which we addressed many of the issues regarding licensing problems and made several recommendations. I still advocate for these suggestions. Specifically, we recommended an initial application for an afforestation licence would also include single consent for future road building, thinning and felling. What is really adding to the backlog in processing licence applications is the need to apply for three separate licences at each juncture in the progression of a forest: to develop a road; to thin the trees; and then to fell them. I still advocate the adoption of this recommendation from our report.

Based on the dashboard information, as received today, I have some questions for the Minister of State. As she rightly stated, the numbers have improved and the backlog of applications has decreased. If we look, however, at the number of afforestation licences issued in the year to date, these amount to 621. In the same time, 2,894 felling licences were issued. Four times more licences have been issued for felling than for afforestation. I do not need to explain the consequences of this. If we are cutting down more trees than we are planting, then we are facing a problem. We are a long way short of meeting our 8,000 ha target. Given the average afforestation licence is for 7 ha, how many afforestation licences does the Minister of State envisage we would need to approve annually to meet this 8,000 ha target?

Equally, what communication has there been with the nursery sector? This is an area that again, because of what happened in the past, has not been able to predict what availability of saplings will be needed and, therefore, what number of seedlings it will need to sow every year. These nurseries have no idea what number of licences are going to be granted, so it has been nigh on impossible for them to predict what volume of saplings they will need to supply the forestry industry. Hopefully, and we all do hope this, applications for afforestation licences will take off again based on the new announcement. Are the nurseries ready and prepared to meet demand when it increases?

Based on other conversations we had in the Joint Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine today, I request that the Minister of State and her Department keep a close eye on, and thoroughly monitor, the proposed new EU nature restoration law. If we are to believe what we have been told, there is potential in this regard for a requirement that up to 70% of our blackbog-type, previously drained soil be restored to its original standard of 70 years ago. We are led to believe that this includes such land that is planted. If it was not planted 70 years ago, this would have an enormous effect on our overall acres of forestry. It is, therefore, extremely important that the Minister of State's Department monitor this aspect. I wish to hear her comments at the end regarding this proposal and what effect it would have on our overall forestry figures if it were to come to fruition.

I would also like the Minister of State to give some more detail on the newly-proposed road grants in the programme, if she has any more information on this aspect. As I said, I am aware the Minister of State's plan is still at the stage of public consultation. The t's are not crossed nor the i's dotted and I accept this.

Turning to a few other queries, the forestry type, FT, 11 and 12 grant rates are probably not going to be accurate in future now, based on the change to the species requirement, with the requirement for a plantation to have 20% broadleaf trees. This will mean that people involved in forestry will incur additional costs. There is no allowance for an increase in these grants contained in the programme, as far as I am aware.

While I welcome everything in this plan and it is all well intentioned, will large-scale institutional bodies be able to avail of the same grants? If so, it is vitally important that we monitor the progress of this programme to ensure that, albeit unintentionally, it does not enhance large-scale institutional developments further. As the Minister of State said in her statement, this plan is intended to bring more farmers into this scheme and this is what we all want.

I welcome the Minister of State. I am standing in for Senator Lombard. Today's statements are based on a request submitted by the Senator several weeks ago in respect of the justifiable concerns we had concerning forestry. I refer to the absence of the figures for the new forestry programme. We were hearing talk of that information not being available until January.

The Government has set a target to plant 8,000 ha in 2023, and yet we only reached 2,000 ha this year. In this regard, Glennon Brothers sawmill group is a significant employer in my area. There are many concerns in this regard for the forestry sector in future. It is important, though, to note and welcome the announcement made last week. I record my thanks to the Minister of State, Senator Hackett, the Minister of State, Deputy Heydon, and the Minister, Deputy McConalogue, for getting this programme across the line, the significant funding that has been put in place and for letting the farming community know exactly where it stands in this context.

There are significant increases of up to 70% in the premiums and, as the Minister of State and Senator Paul Daly said, an extension from 15 to 20 years. This will now give the farming community the opportunity to decide on whether a profitable use of land is to plant forestry or to use it for tillage or alternative farming. I noticed the figures in the plan referring to a 10-acre plantation moving from €70,000 to €150,000 in premiums over the 20-year period, with a cut out after 30 years at €500,000. It works out, therefore, at roughly €21,500 annually for that 10-acre plot over the 30-year period. A significant amount of money, therefore, has been put in place.

As Senator Paul Daly said, however, there has been a lack of trust in this area. To be quite honest, this needs to be rebuilt. If we go back to the downturn in the economy, when people planted forestry back in 2004, 2005 and 2006, we have had a reduction in premiums since then and also seen the whole issue of ash dieback strike and the significant number of forests that were planted impacted by this disease. Many people in this situation do not feel they have been adequately looked after or compensated. Are there any plans to help farmers in this situation?

In the context of a Commencement matter discussion with the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, I put forward a proposal regarding Lough Ree power station. This was back when there was talk of electricity shortages. We have a power station that has been shut, as is the case in County Offaly in Shannonbridge. We accept the issue with bogland, but we have a large acreage of forestry affected by ash dieback. What do we do with it? Is it worth considering cutting this timber, bringing it to the site, chipping it and then burning it in the power plants? This would be one way of addressing the issue of ash dieback in our forests while also providing power.

Turning to the issue of licences, this topic is cropping up regularly. It has been discussed in this House since I was elected more than two and a half years ago and we still do not seem to have made any inroads into it.

They have not been sufficient. When a planning application for a house is made, a reply must be received within a set period of three months at most.

We still have not cleared up the issue of having three different licences in forestry. We need to create a system which allows that when a person applies for a forestry licence, thinning, roads and everything else is built into a single system. That would give people a bit more confidence and reduce the chances of people objecting to the planting of forests.

We are seeking to increase the percentage of housing built from timber to 80%. It is difficult to see us reaching that target, although I happen to have returned from Finland last weekend where most of the houses are built of timber and I must say they are extremely warm. It is the way to go but we have a lot of work to do to change that narrative. If we could, we could build an entire industry to build timber frame houses. However, perhaps we need to put a little more pressure on our local authorities. The State is building and funding X number of thousands of social houses per year. Should we require a minimum of those houses to be timber frame houses? We have not done that yet we are funding them.

We have a lot of work to do. We are aiming to move from 11% to 18% of forestry cover, whereas the EU average is 38%. The Department of Housing, Local Government and Housing, which is funding social housing, should provide that a minimum number of these be timber frame houses. That would help the industry as well.

I welcome the forestry plan. It gives certainty where there was none a number of weeks ago but more work needs to be done to build trust. There are many strong ambitions in it but it is up to the Government to put policies in place to meet those ambitions. We have an ambition to increase the number of timber frame houses in the country to 80% of those built, yet the Government has not done anything with regard to the houses that we fund and build.

I commend the Minister of State on securing such a significant amount of funding for the forestry industry.

I dtús báire, ba mhaith liom fáilte a chur roimh an Aire go dtí an Teach. Tá áthas orm go bhfuil an deis agam labhairt sa díospóireacht seo.

There was quite a bit of media fanfare about the new forestry strategy and while I welcome its publication, it amounted to only a single page dealing with payment rates. The previous strategy amounted to almost 150 pages and it will likely be the new year before that is available.

The draft plan is open for consultation until the end of the month. We are all on the same page on some elements of the forestry strategy. It is important that we get it right. There is a lot riding on it. Ireland's forestry cover is very low compared with our international peers. Only 2% is native woodland and that is among the lowest in the world. We are all in agreement that many jobs in rural communities rely on forestry. It is an understatement to say that forestry is an important sector in our economy. It is vital not only for our economy and society but also in environmental terms. Many of our carbon neutrality targets are riding on us getting the forestry strategy right. It am not overstating the case when I say how important it is that we get this right and point out the role forestry must play.

The main show in town is first and foremost reducing the amount of greenhouse gases we release into the air. Our focus must be on reducing emissions. We must not allow ourselves to be sidetracked into thinking we can continue a business as usual approach and somehow compensation by forestry and other removals will get us out the gap. That is simply not correct.

We also cannot forget that the impact of forestry on emissions takes decades to be felt. For example, any changes in forestry today will have very little impact on reducing emissions by 2030. That said, emissions will continue to be released from hard to abate sectors of the economy and we will need forestry to compensate for those. It is important to note that the land use, land-use change and forestry or LULUCF sector, which is much easier to say, is currently a net source of emissions and we face a major challenge to reduce those. The Joint Committee on Environment and Climate Action heard today about some of the potential for land use in reducing emissions.

Biodiversity is another environmental aspect to forestry. People often conflate the biodiversity crisis and the climate crisis. They are not the same thing. They are two separate crises. Biodiversity is impacted by climate change but it can equally be impacted by climate action and it is important that we protect both and address both of those crises. For too long, forestry plantations have been a major driver of biodiversity loss, especially the mono-crop plantations of Sitka spruce. For this reason, it is particularly welcome to see the increased focus on native forestry in the document that was launched. There are higher payment rates for native forestry and a new rewilding payment. I would like to hear the Minister of State's rationale for setting it at a lower rate than the other schemes. I would also like to know why the space dedicated to rewilding is being limited to 50 ha per annum compared with the 4,645 ha of Sitka spruce monocultures.

The Government's publication has got it off the hook for the time being but we all accept that delays are threatening the sector's viability. There is a long history of administrative issues in the forestry sector. It is all well and good offering higher payment rates and establishment grants are welcome but there were underspends of €7 million and €8.9 million in forestry in 2021 and 2022, respectively, and more than 6,000 ha of licensed afforestation remains unplanted. Those figures indicate that the challenge in the forestry sector is one of confidence. The Government must address that issue as well.

There are still significant issues with applications for licences. I know the Minister of State employed additional ecologists when she came into office and that is welcome but we must do better at screening out the bad applications upstream so they do not cause delays downstream. I have figures for the soft licensing target, which show that 100 per week have been missed in 65% of weeks to date this year. The Government missed the target for 28 weeks and only met it for 15 weeks. Some 1,683 licences remain on hand for more than 120 days. Only 2,000 ha have been planted this year to date, while 2,016 ha were planted in 2021 and 2,435 ha were planted in 2020. The last time the State's afforestation rate reached 2,000 ha per year was in the middle of the Second World War.

Members will all remember the heated debates of 2020 as the forestry legislation made its way through these Houses. I warned then that the draconian reforms would not be adequate to address the problems in the system. As is the case in the planning system, it is not good enough to simply fast-track bad plans. We end up with a mess and do not achieve what we all say we want to achieve, namely, greater afforestation rates. We have the same issue with housing. When we try to block people's access to justice and fast-track bad plans we do not get to the root of the problem and it does not speed up the process. That is why it is so important to protect the right of the public to participate in the judicial process. Sinn Féin has a track record of seeking to amend legislation to strengthen public participation and bring greater clarity, especially with respect to those who feel existing afforestation has been detrimental to their communities. Until their concerns are addressed and the bad applications are weeded out far earlier in the process, we will continue to fall short of our targets.

Sinn Féin looks forward to working with the Minister of State because, as I stated, we are all in agreement that we need greater afforestation. We need it for our communities, employment and timber built houses but also to address climate change and the biodiversity crisis.

I apologise for leaving shortly. I have to attend another meeting but I will listen back to the Minister of State's responses.

I welcome the Minister of State to the Chamber. It is useful to briefly reflect on the fact these statements are taking place while COP27 is ongoing in Egypt. Sustainable and nature-focused forestry is essential to both climate action and biodiversity. In that global context, I welcome that President-elect Lula of Brazil is committed to the protection of the Amazon rainforest and I also welcome the fact that the world's three biggest rainforest nations, Brazil, Indonesia and the Democratic Republic of Congo, have formally launched a climate partnership to work together on conservation.

Countries in the global north, including Ireland, must do everything we can to support the protection of our rainforests and ensure there is an end to multinational companies actively destroying nature and biodiversity. I am not sure if the Minister of State heard the speech made by the President of Colombia at the UN. It was one of the most powerful speeches I have ever heard on the Amazon and climate. If she has not heard it, I recommend that she listen to it as it was impressive.

To return to Ireland, in its annual review for 2022, the Climate Change Advisory Council, CCAC, stated that Ireland is not achieving its national ambition for afforestation. We need to be clear that forestry is currently a net emitter of greenhouse gases in Ireland, not a carbon sink. This is according to the FRL 2021-2015 report from the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine titled, Ireland: National Forestry Accounting Plan. The report concludes with the extremely worrying information that Ireland's forest estate transitioned from a carbon sink capturing CO2 to a source of CO2 during the 2012 to 2017 period and that there are indications of likely increases in greenhouse gas emissions from 420 gigatonnes in 2018 to 2,161 gigatonnes CO2-equivalent by 2025.

On the accounting and budgetary framework we use for forestry, there is a concern that carbon sequestration potential for forestry is not being accurately portrayed. We need to be honest about the fact that trees when planted take between 20 and 30 years to sequester significant amounts of carbon. If a whole area is then subsequently clear-felled, this releases a huge amount of carbon from the soil. This needs to be reflected in our accounting frameworks and from a scientific point of view, we need to ensure that forward-counting or double-counting is not part of our forestry accounting frameworks.

With regard to our wider forestry policy, we do not have a model in Ireland which supports biodiversity or climate action. For example, we still have one of the highest rates of plantation forestry in the EU and the highest share of forest area comprised of invasive species, particularly Sitka spruce which makes up over half of our forest estate. In investigations conducted in 2020, Noteworthy documented many of the issues with our forestry system. For example, between 2010 and 2020, only three environmental impact assessments were carried out in respect of 17,000 afforestation licence applications received by the forest service and that licences for plantations continued to be approved on, or near, peat soils and other high nature value areas.

On the issues of planting on peatlands, we need to wake up to the scientific evidence. Experts, including from An Taisce, have repeatedly warned that planting on peatlands has a huge impact on drainage and the water quality of our rivers. There are examples of cases where afforestation licences have been granted for planting peatlands which have direct hydrological connections to special areas of conservation, SACs, such as the River Moy SAC. Currently, the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine allows planting on peatland of a depth of less than 50 cm. Peatlands are the largest natural land-based carbon store. The area covered by near natural peatland worldwide, which is greater than 3 million square kilometres, sequesters 0.37 gigatonnes of CO2 a year and stores more carbon than all other vegetation types in the world combined. Peatlands are essential to our survival as a species and for the planet as we know it. It is dangerous when they are damaged. Emissions from drained peatlands are estimated at 1.9 gigatonnes of CO2 annually, the equivalent of 5% of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. This is a disproportionate amount considering damaged peatlands cover just 0.3% of land-mass.

I will ask a series of questions at this point. How does the Government plan to reverse the trend by which Ireland is becoming a net emitter on forestry? On accounting, will the Minister of State commit to no forward- or double-counting and a scientific-based approach? Will the Department pursue a policy of the right tree in the right place, as described in the CCAC's technical note on the carbon budgets, including ensuring appropriate prioritisation is given to native tree species and appropriate species diversity? Will the Department institute a policy of refusing licences on any form of peatlands, including bogs that have been degraded, given the potential for rewetting?

I will conclude by addressing our national history. Ireland was once covered in forests and native tree species such as birch, oak and elm. We then had periods of fast deforestation over centuries. Today, we need a forestry model that is sustainable and protects our planet. We need to move away from the current model. I urge the Minister of State to seriously reflect on the questions I have asked.

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this debate. Since my good friend Senator Malcolm Byrne has arrived with a number of fire crew members, I assure them I am not about to say anything explosive that will require their skill sets. I live in a part of County Clare that has a considerable amount of afforestation. We regularly have forest fires at certain times of the year. I pay tribute to the fire services and crews in that context because the work they do can be long, laborious and very dangerous, in addition to everything else they do. I am delighted to see members of the fire service here and I welcome them.

It is great to have the Minister of State, as one of our own, in the House. It is great that she sits at the Cabinet table and gets an opportunity to reflect more directly the views of this House. It was often said that Ministers paid less regard to this House than the other House and other aspects but the Minister of State, as a Senator, has a capacity to listen and share our thoughts. I welcome the work she has done to date and the significant amount of funding she and the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Deputy McConalogue, have secured in this year's round of funding, as identified by my colleague Senator Paul Daly. As previous speakers said, there is significant work to do to regain the confidence of potential forestry owners. There have been repeated announcements over the years about the volume of land that needs to be planted to meet our timber let alone climate change needs and we have fallen short on a continuous basis. There are many reasons for it but we have to learn from that and move on.

As the Minister of State is aware as we have discussed it in the House, there are significant issues about licensing too. I met a number of forestry owners and people who want to get into forestry recently. They cannot get their heads around the notion that if planting commercial timber involves going through so many different aspects of licensing. As night follows day, if you put a cake in to bake, at some point you will take it out of the oven and it will be eaten. If you plant a forest on a commercial basis, it follows that it will have to be harvested and processed. I cannot understand why there cannot be a one-time approach where all the work gets done at the beginning or part of the way through. I have numerous files in my office relating to people who have been waiting for felling licences for a considerable period. When they are told it will be two or three years, they just cannot get their heads around it. That is a disincentive. Perhaps the situation is improving and I have no doubt it will improve given the ecologists the Minister of State has appointed. We have work to do now to convince others who have been turned off as a result of this.

I have also met foresters and I received an email from the Social, Economic, Environmental Forestry Association, SEEFA, with which the Minister of State will be familiar, in which it raised a number of questions. I will put these to the Minister of State and perhaps she will get an opportunity to address them. As average sites are 7 ha and only 50% of licences progress to planting, how many licences are required each week to achieve the 8,000 ha afforestation target? Over the past six weeks, how many ecologists were involved in processing an average of 14 licences in that period? What is the cost of ecology input alone to issue an afforestation licence? How long on average did it take the Department to process each application and are these likely to proceed?

There are real concerns here. I know the Minister of State will not get a chance to answer all of those questions but I will pass them on to her.

Senator Carrigy has spoken about the concerns with regard to ash dieback. I regularly hear from farmers who do not feel that they have been appropriately compensated or that there is enough support for them. In that context, I ask the Minister of State to come back to us at another stage on the reconstitution and underplanting scheme, RUS. She might identify what the current uptake is under the existing scheme. How many hectares, out of the total number of acres applied for, were actually affected? Are health and safety risks associated with dead and rotten ash trees breaking in strong winds? I spoke to a farmer yesterday who has a row of ash trees along a boundary fence adjoining a main road. There is a concern that these trees will fall. Are they the responsibility of the farmer, given that they were not planted as part of a forestry? Should the local authorities, in recognition of ash dieback, have a programme or a scheme to remove these trees where they are along the boundaries of main roads? It would be appreciated if it could be done in conjunction with the local authorities. I thank the Minister of State.

I thank the Minister of State for coming to the House for this debate. I got to hear some of her speech. I understand there are no copies of her opening statement available, which is funny given that we are talking about trees, timber and paper. If we are not going to be provided with paper copies of speeches, perhaps they could be emailed to us when the opening statement is made.

I have questions for the Minister of State around the industry in my local area of Roscommon and east Galway. Senator Doherty and I were fortunate to be part of a group that visited Murray Timber Group in Ballygar. It was so impressive to see the measures the company is putting in place to adapt and be ready for the industry of the future, for example in terms of automation and upskilling the existing workforce there. Ballygar is a small town on the boundary between Galway and Roscommon and this company offers employment to people in that area.

I would like to see a balance between the demands we have here that ensures industry is supported in rural areas. The challenge we have is that so many workers are being drawn to city centres and so much of our workforce is on the high end. People can get degrees in areas like medical technology, pharmaceuticals and manufacturing, but we also need to ensure we are supporting a workforce that is available locally. Arbor Forest Management, another group that has a company based in Ballinasloe but has its headquarters in Cork, deals with farmers around licences. I know that this was a major issue a number of years ago, and that changes have been made, but there is still an impact around ensuring we have the ecologists. Could the Minister of State comment in her closing statement on the number of ecologists who have been brought into the Department and the number of licences that have been issued in the last while around afforestation and access?

Ash dieback was mentioned by colleagues earlier. There is real concern around ash dieback in many garden centres I have been in recently. People in that sector are very interested in the environment, forestry and trees in general and are very knowledgeable on those topics. The ash dieback issue is across the Shannon and really has an impact on the west. I would welcome whatever comments the Minister of State has on that.

We have had presentations from an industry that is fearful of change in this area. I understand the elements the Minister of State is bringing forward in terms of the promotion of the broadleaf tree - she wants to ensure we have more native trees and they are broadleaf trees - and the impact that brings. We know from the oak tree that 200 types of insects are supported. However, there needs to be a balance with local industry. I am conscious of rural industry, in particular.

I thank the Minister of State for being here to listen to our comments. I welcome the plan. It is very significant to have a proposed investment of €1.3 billion in the Irish forestry sector. As we know, it is the largest ever investment by any Irish Government in tree planting. I wish to acknowledge that it is part of the national forestry programme. It is absolutely essential in helping us to reach the objectives of the strategy, which is designed to provide an overarching framework that identifies the actions needed to implement the changes required for Ireland's forests and reflects the ambition contained in the shared national vision for trees, woods and forests in Ireland until 2050. The programme is built around the principle of the right trees in the right places for the right reasons with the right management. That is absolutely crucial to deliver a more diverse forest and to meet multiple societal, economic, social and environmental objectives.

In County Kildare, we have wonderful forests that people walk in for leisure. Forests such as Donadea, Killinthomas, Moore Abbey and Mullaghreelan are very sociable and environmental places where people can go and, as they say, bathe in trees. They say now that it is more therapeutic than being beside water. Obviously, that part of it is really important. In terms of planting trees for commercial and climate purposes, I had a look at the Kildare County Council development plan. In the last survey that was done, 10,396 ha of the county was in forest, which accounts for just 6.1% of the overall land of the county. Given that the average around the country is 10.5%, we are falling well behind. Of that area, 50% is in public ownership and the remainder is in private ownership. My own family has land in forestry. It is good that a majority of native species - approximately 62% - are planted in the forest. There is huge scope to support and encourage landowners to use their land in this way. It goes without saying that forestry activities should be appropriate in terms of nature and scale so they are not visually intrusive on the landscape and do not cause damage to important habitats or the ecology of the area.

Senator Dooley touched on the importance of building supports and trust with the landowners. It is of concern that the average number of licences issued over the past six weeks was just 14. Average sites are 7 ha and only 50% of licences progressed to planting. We need a sizeable number of licences to achieve the targets we have. I would like the Minister of State to address this. It is critical that the forestry programme matches our climate ambitions with significantly increased financial supports to encourage farmers and landowners to consider forestry as a viable land use on their land. We have a lot of work to do to ensure everybody buys into this and gets what they expect. The Minister, Deputy McConalogue, has said that unprecedented incentives will provide a valuable addition to farm income and help to meet national climate and biodiversity objectives. It is important that this funding guarantees continued payments to forest owners who have planted under the current scheme and are still in receipt of premiums, while offering new and improved financial supports to those who undertake planting and sustainable forest management under the new programme.

I wish the Minister of State, Senator Hackett; the Minister, Deputy McConalogue; and the Department well in terms of the roll-out and meeting the challenges that are there.

I thank the Acting Chairperson and the Senators for the invitation to speak and their passionate input into their questions and statements. This issue has been discussed at length since I took office and continues to be discussed. After a little over two years, we are getting to a stage where the sector is in a much healthier position and state. We are about to embark on a new strategy for trees, woodlands and forestry in Ireland over the next decade. The vision that extends to 2050 is about what we hear all the time - the right tree in the right place for the right purpose and under the right management. That management piece is important, given many of the concerning legacy issues regarding forestry. Another word that came up was "balance". That is where I see my place in striking the right balance so that we are delivering not only for rural economies, the climate, water quality or biodiversity into the future but also for people. That amenity value shone through in Senator O'Loughlin's remarks.

A number of Senators, including Senators Paul Daly, Carrigy, Dooley and Dolan, touched on the lack of confidence in the sector. We have seen that over the last few years in the low levels of interest in planting trees. It is now getting to a crisis stage regarding the targets we need to hit. We have announced the new programme and we have sizeable incentives in place for forest owners. We are relying almost wholly on private landowners to plant the trees of the future. We need engagement and confidence injected back into the sector. The Government has worked hard to deliver a lucrative incentive and reward for farmers. Farmers will now be paid for up to 20 years, as opposed to 15 years. Non-farmers will stay at the 15-year payment rate. We are trying to incentivise private farmers and landowners to plant trees. The variety of options now available to farmers should also make them have a look at the new programme and scheme rates. As I alluded to, the premium rates have increased quite substantially. There is a shift towards wanting to plant more native and broadleaf trees, but that is the direction of travel. That is where the direction from the EU is going and what our citizens want. Again, it is about striking the balance with the commercial sector and the need to continue to supply softwoods into the softwood sector. I spoke earlier about the need to increase significantly the amount of timber we use in construction, whether it is in domestic homes or larger builds such as schools and multi-storey buildings. The scope is massive. We need to work hard to deliver on that over the next few years and even the next decade. I would like to see that significantly improved upon.

I will focus on some of the specific matters raised. Senator Daly spoke about the comparison between the afforestation licences and the areas planted versus the felling licences. A felling licence comes with an obligation to replant. It is not like the lands are no longer used for trees; they are replanted. Afforestation is the figure we look at in terms of increased land. There may be individual examples of that not happening, particularly in areas that should perhaps not have been planted in the first place. Many of those are under State ownership. In the cases of many peatlands in the west, which are more than likely under public ownership by Coillte, forests have failed because they should not have been planted in those places. There are some good developments between Coillte and the National Parks and Wildlife Service, NPWS. They will be transferring lands to manage them for biodiversity. Examples across the western seaboard include Coillte Nature delivering the wild western peatlands project and the collaborative effort by Coillte and Bord na Móna on the midlands native woodland project. There are movements away from poorly planted areas to areas that will now be managed with biodiversity.

The nursery sector is well aware of the situation. It is represented in my forestry policy group and in Project Woodland. I have visited nurseries. The Minister, Deputy McConalogue, recently visited a nursery. Plantation rates have increased in FT 11 and FT 12. In the case of FT 11, the annual rate has increased from €590 to €863 per hectare. In the case of FT 12, the annual rate has increased from €510 to €746 per hectare. This is quite a significant increase in funding under those schemes.

A number of Senators brought up the issue of the single consent. Philip Lee does not agree with the single consent. The EU does not agree with the single consent process. At the end of the day, applications for felling licences are going to be decades apart. It is going to be a decade or more before one looks for a thinning licence and another decade or so before one looks for the final felling licence. It is not as if they all have to go through three years in a row or anything like that. The single consent is not going to work because things change - management changes and environmental law changes. We ran aground on that in 2018 and 2019. We will be back there fairly swiftly if we look at a full single consent. There is scope within the Phillip Lee report to look at mechanisms to make the process more efficient. We cannot avoid the requirements under environmental law but we can make them more efficient. That is what we have been working towards.

A number of Senators spoke about ash dieback. I was expecting it to come up because it always does. I want to look at it. So far we have had over 500 applications under the RUS, which was established in June or July 2020. I accept that not everyone is happy with it, but it is something I want to look at, perhaps in the new year. A Senator spoke about roadside trees, which are the responsibility of the landowner. The wider issue of ash dieback in our countryside is going to have huge impacts aside from the issue of plantation ash. We need to look at that.

Senators Ruane and Boylan brought up the challenges due to our forestry now becoming a net emitter, as it will continue to be, as well as the LULUCF challenges for our forestry and land use regarding peatlands. That is something we are cognisant of across government. It needs to be addressed. We need to get trees in the ground in the right place as quickly as possible to try to offset any of these issues into the future. I hope this programme will instil enthusiasm for planting trees among our landowners. It is worth saying that we currently have about 4,000 ha of afforestation licences issued this year. Between programmes, people will back off and wait for the next year. Potentially, farmers who are listening now have a licence already granted this year but will wait until January or February to plant. There are trees going into the ground as I speak. People are utilising the licences they currently have. People still want to plant under the current programme for various reasons. It has not entirely ground to a halt, but we need an injection of confidence back in the sector. A lot of that will come from the sector itself. There has been a lot of negativity around forestry in recent years. It falls on all of us, and not just the Government, to try to boost that. I have met many forestry owners over the last few years. I have even met happy owners, but we do not tend to hear from them.

Perhaps there could be more positive stories about forestry and how beneficial it is. I have met a lot of farmers who are interested in planting legacy forests for the future for their grandchildren. It might only be small areas. Perhaps something like the 1 ha scheme might attract them but there is a variety of interests around forestry. We are trying to strike that balance so we get that right.

All of that will be part of the LULUCF calculations, which are separate from agricultural emissions. This will come into play in the next year or year and a half when we complete the land use review. That involves how we use our land. Forestry will be included in that but we certainly need to get moving in terms of planting trees.

We are cognisant of that and need to look into it. We have made mistakes in the past in terms of what we have done with our peatlands and forestry. There are also some good examples. It is not good to be negative all the time about it. Our engagement with the public and stakeholders this year has been like nothing before. I welcome the general warm welcome for the programme. I know the public consultation on the strategy and the programme is still ongoing and I ask people to engage with that. If there are any specific questions, I can probably get back to Members directly. A number of parliamentary questions on the number of ecologists involved with licensing have been answered so those details should be available.

Senator Boylan mentioned the amendment to the appeals legislation in 2020. That was successful in removing the backlog because we increased the number of forestry appeals committees from one to four, which quadrupled the turnaround of the appeals. We still get appeals in, which is the right way. We need to allow that access to justice but we have a system that is much more efficient at dealing with appeals.

I think the overall sense was that it is important to get this right. The short-term part of this is the forestry programme, which will be for the next five years. It will be subject to a mid-term review. We can see what is working, what is working really well and whether parts of it are not working. There is potential to amend that at that stage. I look forward to farmers engaging with this. As I said in my opening statement, it will be subject to state aid approval from the Commission, which will not be a straightforward process. We must find that balance. The Commission will be looking to us in terms of environmental outputs from our forestry programme while we are spending €1.6 billion. What is the return across the board? It is important to say that this balance needs to shine through.

If there is anything I have not dealt with, I am happy to deal with it. Senators can contact my office. It is clear that we share a common desire for the next forestry programme to be a success. That is important. We know afforestation is a key tool in our attempts to mitigate climate change and all the co-benefits that can come from trees in the future. It is fair to say that we do not come from a culture of tree planting in Ireland. We have plantation forests and have one of the youngest forest stocks in Europe. We do not have those 100- or 150-year-old massive swathes of forest that are potentially managed in a continuous cover way. We are not there yet. We are a way from that but we have to do what we can to embark on that process and keep the sector and those rural economies going. However, that must be balanced with environmental outcomes and that is what we aim to do. I thank Senators for their comments.