Martin Kenny (Sligo-Leitrim, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for his presentation. I live in Leitrim where people feel that there has been over-afforestation which has been detrimental to rural communities and there is a serious problem of rural decline and depopulation and the continuous creep of forestry over the landscape is doing nothing to help those communities. The solution we hear is that there is lots of work in it. We do not see the jobs in Leitrim. There are a few jobs in Masonite, where people are processing the pulp wood and some driving trucks are drawing away the timber. Apart from those, however, there are no sustainable jobs to keep people in the community.

Carbon sequestration was the main matter to which the Minister of State referred. Thousands of acres of forestry were planted on what was shallow bog on the mountain sides from Drumshanbo to Ballinamore and through the mountain ranges in Leitrim. Every scientist tells us that if that bog had been left alone, it would sequestrate three times the amount of carbon that it does under forestry. Will that be replanted or will the original habitat, which was better for carbon sequestration be restored. In regard to the issue of the carbon credits, we hear of farmers whose methods produce a lot of carbon. To counteract this, they buy land in the west and other areas and use it to build up carbon credits. Who owns those carbon credits? Is it the person who owns the forest or the State? What value do they have?

Planning is a big issue in many rural areas, particularly in regard to tourism, in areas of great scenic beauty because when forestry creeps in people cannot see the lakes or mountains. They can see only Sitka spruce, black trees growing up in front of them. That is a big problem. Planning permission for forestry is granted only if it is for over 50 ha, which is at least twice the size of most of the land that has been sold for forestry. In the rural north west, landholdings are generally small, at an average of between 20 and 25 ha. Can something be done about the planning permission so that people in the community could feel that they have an input into it?

People also have a gripe about the tax free element of this. There are very few things that we do in this world that are totally tax free and forestry is one of them. That, coupled with the fact that grants available for non-farmers are the same as those for a farmer, make many people in rural communities very sore. They see people from outside the area come in and buy up land, inflating the price of it so that the local farmers cannot compete to buy that land.

They get the same level of grant as a local farmer would get to plant it and any money they make on it is tax free. Some of these individuals are very wealthy business people or people who have a lot of money. They use forestry as an investment from which they can make a massive profit and tax-free income. People feel that is unfair and unjust to the local community. I come across such people all the time. These are small farmers who see a farm coming up for sale beside them and want to buy it. They cannot afford to do so. If they decided to buy the farm, the only way to make money from it would be to plant forestry. Many of these people do not want to plant the land. They want to farm but that opportunity is denied them because the particular system or structure in place prevents farmers from being able to survive in that respect. An article on the AgriLandwebsite today sums up the position. Many people expect that forestry will replace the suckler farming. Many of us believe it will replace the communities we live in, never mind the cows. The issue of the farmer versus the non-farmer is key. It flies in the face of all we hear about the protection of rural communities that the people whose families have been the custodians of rural Ireland for generations find themselves being undermined and bought out. Anyone with more money can come in and buy them out, secure the same grants as they can and make profits that are tax free. Those are issues that the Minister of State needs to address. In County Leitrim, the statistics indicate approximately 17% or 18% of the land is planted, but forestry probably covers more than 50% of available land. This is having a detrimental effect on rural communities in the area.