Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 3 April 2014

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine

Maximising the Usage and Potential of Land: Coillte

12:20 pm

Mr. Gerry Britchfield:

The grant aid for afforestation is not directed at Coillte. We are excluded from that, particularly in relation to the premium elements. Our role is to support landowners, whether they be farmers or others, and give them the confidence to plant. We do that in a number of ways, including our recent work with the private sector on wind blow in the context of the crisis of the last number of weeks. We are trying to create a harvesting infrastructure to facilitate farmers who want to thin their crops. We encourage and support that. We are also providing routes to market. We have two very large panel mills with good demand for pulp wood at a good price. It is a very important support.