Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 12 December 2017

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine

Coillte's Annual Report for 2016 and Climate Change: Discussion

4:00 pm

Mr. Gerard Murphy:

It is a very pertinent question at the moment. The difficulty is that unenclosed lands are often in very environmentally sensitive areas, for example, areas where there is a lot of biodiversity. Equally, there are unenclosed lands where it is appropriate to plant forests. It is question of striking a balance. I do not support a blanket ban on unenclosed areas. We need more research and baseline studies on areas where afforestation should be avoided and where it is possible to plant.