Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

Part of that change will be a change to Coillte. It needs to change. It has done a brilliant job but it was legislated for in the late 1980s when the emphasis and focus was on privatisation and commercial lumber production. That has changed. Coillte's mandate will be changed. It is already changing towards a closer-to-nature model. We recognise that what has been done with forestry, while it delivered acres and lumber, did not deliver better biodiversity or a better nature solution in our country. Coillte too is part of that change. To help it do that, I believe we need to look at the state aid rules which, in 2003, under legal challenge, restricted what Coillte can do. We will go to Brussels, as we are doing for a variety of different issues related to climate change, to get different rules. We will also get Coillte involved in afforestation on public lands and other lands which are not covered under the likes of this deal that was done with the private sector. That private investment in forestry is taking place anyway. The Coillte deal will at least allow it to be open forest.

In my mind, this cannot be the main solution because the scale of change that will be highlighted in the land use review that this Government is introducing, which will be the defining indication of what type of forestry is needed where, is not just about the number of acres but how we restore nature and tackle the biodiversity crisis as well as the climate crisis, which clear-fell monoculture systems do not do. We will need some timber for lumber production for use in buildings and so on. We are not saying there should be absolutely none.

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