Martin Kenny (Sligo-Leitrim, Sinn Fein)
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I thank the witnesses for coming before the committee and giving their rundown of Coillte's position. As has been said, Coillte is one of the largest landowners in the country. It has a vast resource there. I have a couple of questions around that.

One question is in regard to the exports. Mr. Leamy says that Coillte is trying to enhance the value of the product through processing, some of which takes place in the company's two plants. How much of the timber is exported out of the country in bulk timber and what value leaves the country? Is any processing carried out here?

The other issue concerns wind energy. The wind energy business has been prone to causing conflict with communities in many parts of the country. What is Coillte's position in that regard? I know many people are talking about the distances between larger wind turbines and communities, people and households. Does Coillte have particular policy around that? Where does it stand?

I was interested in the final slide, which concerned replacing land sales with partnerships or with leasing land. Mr. Leamy also spoke about the Coillte Premium Partnership. I have come across a number of concerns around the partnership scheme. I know that there are between 700 and 800 people currently in partnerships with Coillte, and many of them are very dissatisfied. I have a couple of questions about that. When farmers enter into a partnership with Coillte, do they have any role in deciding whether to accept the price that is offered for their timber when it is extracted? I would also like to know the role of the farmer in the decision as to whether to sell the timber at a particular time. I have come across farmers who say that when timber is at its bottom price but Coillte needs to move timber out, it is the partnership's timber that they take rather than the timber from their own forestry. Farmers feel that the contracts that they signed up to are being breached in some cases or certainly being stretched, with a negative impact on them. I would like to get the witnesses' response to all that.