Pippa Hackett (Green Party) | Oireachtas source

There is much optimism around at the moment. It is a new year and green shoots are already appearing, while the crisis of Covid is hopefully showing signs of disappearing. Behind the optimism, there still lurks another crisis which shows no sign of going anywhere, the climate and biodiversity one. We are all very aware of it but, understandably, we wonder what we can do about it. One thing I am asking everyone to do this year is to talk about and think about trees.

Trees matter. When it comes to climate, they sequester and store carbon and, apart from providing us with beautiful surroundings and amenities, in the right place they also provide a whole range of biodiversity, water and ecological benefits. They also, of course, take a long time to grow and leave quite a gap when they are felled, which is why the questions such as where, how, when and why trees are planted need to be answered.

One of my remits is to oversee the way in which we incentivise tree planting. Our forestry programme is the means through which we do this and a new one is due to come into place this time next year. Before it does, I want to make sure people get the opportunity to engage with all of the issues, become informed about trees and forestry and then give their opinion. The decisions we make this year will shape our woodlands and forests for generations to come. We have a much lower level of forestry cover than almost every other country in Europe and our level of native woodland is particularly low. How do we up it? How do we decide what is planted where and by whom? That is why we need to talk about trees.

We started already with a behaviour and attitudes poll before Christmas. Its findings were encouraging in that it found that we, as a nation, value trees, we love to walk in woodlands and we want and like our mix of both conifers and broadleaves. I can certainly identify with that, living so close to the wonderful woodlands of Emo Court and Charleville Castle. However, the poll also showed that we have not really noticed much talk about trees in the media and we are much less aware than I would like of the benefits of timber for construction, something that cannot be ignored.This is why we need that conversation about trees, which continues this evening when I will engage with the group from An Foróige, a representation of the young people who will be most impacted by the decisions we make this year. This national conversation will continue with the citizens' assembly-style deliberative dialogue with 99 members of the general public, along with further online public engagement.

Two weeks ago, the chair of the Climate Change Advisory Council, Marie Donnelly, said that we are in a serious hole in terms of the afforestation rate in this country and that it is an immediate and urgent challenge to get the policies right so as to reverse that. She is right and I hope that this year, this national conversation on trees will play a big part in addressing that challenge.