Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 28 March 2023

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action

Nature Restoration Law and Land Use Review: Discussion

Mr. Joe Condon:

Members could consider what we are doing here today to be a sort of stakeholder engagement.

If the land use review document is evidence-gathering for phase 2, they conducted a regional analysis of land cover, and while land cover categories most associated with high biodiversity value occur predominantly in the Border, west and mid-west regions, that is close to 40% of the land area. They are describing it here that when the mapping practice occurred, it came across as a high biodiversity value area. Does one require nature restoration to high biodiversity value, when 40% of land comes under that land cover category?

There is a map here that shows high nature value land and which shows, pretty much, the 40% they are describing in this. There is conflicting information coming across.