Mr. Colm Hayes:

To be clear, the 16 ecologists are spread across the strands of the licensing. Some of them are working on Coillte licences and others on private licences. In regard to the 300 licences, the output is a mix of the output across the 16 ecologists. In the context of a sector that is worth €2 billion annually to the economy and is in crisis, it is an investment that is absolutely essential in our view. In this day and age, it is not possible to function without ecology resources being at the heart of everything we do. That applies to the forestry companies as much as it applies to us.

In terms of the question, we have about 1,900 licences in what we classify as our ecology backlog. We have set ourselves targets this year which will involve clearance of that backlog by the end of the year. That is a massive challenge. We would hope to have the capacity to do more in terms of files that are screened in for ecology. In overall terms, we processed about 2,500 licences last year. We would be very hopeful that we can process somewhere in the region of 4,500 licences this year, which will be an 80% increase on licences issued in the last year. That is a massive challenge. I cannot underestimate the challenge when it comes to an individual licence. Part of the work in regard to the 4,500 licences will involve the clearing of the backlog of files on the ecology work list in addition to the private files which do not go near ecology and the Coillte files as well. I hope this gives the Deputy and the committee an indication of where we see the broad outlook for the year.