Tom Hayes (Tipperary South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

It is no harm to take the opportunity to echo a lot of what I said in my Second Stage contribution here. It is always very important to lay out our vision for the future. There is great potential for forestry in Ireland and we need to mark out a roadmap.

When the Government came to power it decided to see whether Coillte needed to be sold or retained as a national asset. That was a brave decision and was welcomed by everybody across the political divide. In general, the public at large welcomed the fact that Coillte would stay in State ownership and that the vast resource would be used for the benefit of people. It was important to link what Coillte has with tourism, the environment, schools and to get people to understand the industry more.

I have travelled up and down the country and had an opportunity to visit a huge number of Coillte and private sites. Let me address the Coillte sites. I realised that there is an opportunity for tourism in every parish and county, particularly along the western coast and part of the eastern coast. Some counties have a lot of forestry and there is also great potential in terms of walkways. We all know that tourists want to come here to enjoy walks in the fresh air so we should have more organised walks on Coillte lands. There are great opportunities to develop this tourism sector.

Last Tuesday I was in Galway and met the acting chief executive of Coillte. We spoke at length about the potential of linking Coillte with tourism projects and I found the organisation was very much on board with the idea. That is a roadmap of where Coillte is going. I could talk about this issue for hours because it is such a fantastic forestry project.

The forestry programme that is currently under discussion is out there for public consultation, and the stakeholders are now making their observations. Many changes will take place and we must go to Brussels before the end of the year. We hope to have that new programme ready for 1 January 2015. Land review policies are also under discussion. Some180,000 acres of land could be planted. A review is taking place and the hen harrier issue is part of that. I have been in constant consultation with the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht. We met only last week, and may meet again next week. Last night I met a group of people who were concerned about the delay in allowing that land to be planted. There are huge opportunities there. Dr. Nuala Ní Fhlatharta, head of the forestry development department at Teagasc, is chairing a group that is trying to make land availability clearer and give direction on the issue into the future. I hope to have that report to hand before the end of the year. If we have that to hand, we will put a bigger forestry programme in place.

Broadly, there are huge opportunities for employment. I was in Connemara, County Galway last week, which I think is in Senator Ó Clochartaigh's constituency-----