Brendan Ryan (Dublin North, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome this Bill which gives the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine increased power to support, improve and protect our forestry industry. It is vital to have a strong and growing forestry industry that will support and create jobs and which, I believe, can have considerable spin-off benefits for tourism and our environmental ecosystems.

In 1996, under the rainbow coalition Government, a report entitled Growing for the Future – A Strategic Plan for the Development of the Forestry Sector in Ireland was released and it has provided a basis for Government policy ever since. In particular, the plan sets out the implementation of sustainable forest management. In the strategic plan targets were set for forest cover as a percentage of Irish land, afforestation, that is, the planting of new forests, and annual timber production. Unfortunately, under successive governments we have fallen well short of our targets. Under the strategic plan, targets for planting 25,000 ha per annum up to 2000 and 20,000 ha per annum thereafter were set with the goal of increasing forestry in Ireland from 7% to 17% by 2030. Subsequently, annual timber production should have increased from the 1995 figure of 2.2 million cu. tonnes to 10 million cu. tonnes. We have fallen well short of our targets in both areas with our levels of afforestation actually decreasing and our annual timber production remaining relatively flat.

With this Bill, the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine can push for us to reach our targets in afforestation and timber production and I expect he will do so. The Bill also strengthens the Minister's role in conserving our environment through the removal of threats such as fire, the use of good forest management and the protection against damage from disease, invasive species, pests and other organisms. Last week we learned of confirmed reports of ash dieback at a plantation in Leitrim containing imported ash trees. The trees were destroyed in a bid to contain the outbreak and avoid the spread of the disease as has occurred on mainland Europe.

Section 29 empowers the Minister to make regulations to protect our trees, including the restriction or expulsion from the State of any invasive species which could be deemed harmful to the environment. Our ecosystem is under an increasing threat from invasive species beyond trees and plants, from grey squirrels to giant hogweed to the North America crayfish. Invasive species threaten our delicate ecosystems and a strong response is required from State bodies to combat them. I call on the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine and all future Ministers with responsibility for forestry to act swiftly under the powers contained in the Bill to counter the threats of invasive species and the damage they do to our natural environment.

Apart from benefits to the timber industry and the improvement in our environment, forests provide the largest outdoor area for recreational use in Ireland, attracting 18 million tourists per annum. This recreational use generates €268 million in economic activities for communities, especially in rural areas. This figure could increase further and generate more economic activity. However, to accomplish this we need a comprehensive cross-departmental strategy which should be led by the Minister to link our forestry industry with our tourism industry to maximise its potential. We could look to the tourism forestry protocol agreement in the Australian state of Tasmania for an example of joined-up strategy between a forestry industry and state tourism boards. I call on the Minister to consider a similar approach in Ireland. Such an agreement in Ireland, facilitating communication, consultation and liaison, would ensure the forestry industry and the tourism authorities would recognise that together their respective industries are crucial to the delivery of sustainable growth of the Irish economy, especially in rural Ireland.

Under Section 8, the Minister can establish one or more committees to advise and assist him in his functions. I encourage the Minister to examine the setting up of a cross-departmental group to promote forestry tourism. This would have manifold benefits for tourism in rural Ireland.

As a Labour Deputy, I am pleased to speak to this Bill on forestry after the contribution of my party in government in ensuring that Coillte remains in public ownership. I am convinced that this outcome would have been less certain without the Labour Party in government. I acknowledge the campaign conducted by the IMPACT trade union in the achievement of this outcome. The irrefutable economic argument for the retention of harvesting rights made by IMPACT and the economist Peter Bacon was supported by the Labour Party and our partners, Fine Gael, in government in a palpable example of what we are achieving. Against this backdrop we can look forward to improving our forestry industry, investing energy into expanding our afforestation programmes and, in turn, creating improved benefits for our economy and with this in mind I welcome the Bill.

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