Dr. Ken Byrne:

I will respond to the Deputy's first point about forested peatlands. Perhaps I would say this anyway but from a scientific perspective, our knowledge on the ground based on actual data collection is almost non-existent. We need to address that gap urgently but I also agree with Dr. Moran that we need to get moving and start doing things. We need a good monitoring programme. There has been some rewetting of forested bogs in the past. Coillte has a new programme called Wild Western Peatlands, and is working on that in the Inagh Valley in Connemara, for example. There is effort going on in those places. We need demonstration and testing on the ground to identify the kinds of sites where rewetting can be achieved and is most feasible. That is probably most likely in the short term in places where drainage did not work very well in the first instance. They can perhaps be more easily put onto a rewetting trajectory. One also has to pay consideration to the interaction with the surrounding landscape, where it may cross land ownership boundaries, and how that impact may come the other way. Professor Joosten said that wetlands and peatlands are landscapes so they have to be considered in a landscape context. They are not something you can draw a line around and isolate and say you will rewet here. There will be spillover impacts and they need to be considered. We also need to consider that if forested peatlands are to be taken out of forestry the impact that will have on the wider forestry sector and the larger landscape level in terms of the services that might come from those forests. I am mainly thinking about timber production and what that means for elsewhere. I do not know if those are useful responses.