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

I agree with this. It is exactly in line with what I was saying. We cannot be punitive or point the finger. It has to be remunerated, supported and voluntary. I will give several more examples. An area where I see real progress is in the work done by Bord na Móna and others on State land where we are rewetting up to 30,000 ha. We will do this in the lifetime of the Government. Bord na Móna is using the same skills it developed over the years. It is happening and it is working. It goes beyond what anyone has been speaking about in the nature restoration law in terms of targets. It is a real possibility.

The other key policy lever is the implementation of the new forestry programme that was agreed by the Government. It has a €1.3 billion budget behind it. To show the complexity of this, and it is complex, our biggest challenge has been getting it through the European Commission and getting its support for it. It has conflicting objectives in terms of the birds and habitats directives. Unfortunately it is very complex. We need to act and deliver on the forestry programme and scale up forestry way beyond anything that has done before. This more than anything else requires local knowledge. Real skill will be involved in getting this right so we plant the right tree in the right place. We need to protect our other nature services and systems while, at the same time, we deliver new native and natural woods and the variety of woods that we will need. What is most important is to get agreement from the European Commission on state aid rules on the forestry programme so we step in the right direction.

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