Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Wednesday, 5 October 2022
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine
EU Nature Restoration Target: COPA-COGECA
Mr. Niall Curley:
Yes. It does mean that. I think Article 10 deals specifically with forest areas but it is mainly for pristine or traditional forests. This is peatland. I know there are restoration areas in peatland areas in Finland that are forests but restoration of those areas means the re-wetting of forested areas. In these cases, depending on how the measures are designed and how Ireland decides to put the schemes and programmes forward, just like any other country, it could mean that land that has bogland on which forestry has been promoted, could be taken off again and forcibly kept that way.