Mr. Gerard Murphy:

The idea is worth exploring. One of the concepts is how one gets farmers to see forestry as a viable part of their enterprise. One might talk about cattle, dairy and so on. My own view is that we need to bring forestry into the equation and it needs to be integrated into the overall enterprise. I know the Department is exploring options at the moment. There has been very poor uptake on some of the schemes for agroforestry. It is used in other countries. An option is developing hedgerows in certain areas that could be used. One issue is to have better measures for the carbon sequestration value of this to offset some of the emissions from agriculture. It is an option worth exploring.