Ms Marie Donnelly:

I will comment on the forestry issue. In the legislation, we set ourselves a target of having a climate-neutral economy and society by 2050. I suspect the Deputy will agree with me that we expect there will still be animals in the field in 2050, in which case we will have methane emissions. If we are to have a climate-neutral economy and society, this means we will have to have some sink mechanism to absorb that methane. This is one of the reasons we need forestry.

It provides the balance to maintain our agriculture on one hand and to have a sink. One balances one with the other. This is the rationale for having the Government targets for forestry and needing forestry to increase in the country, so that we have this balancing of emissions from animals, which we will still have, with the sink coming through in the forest.