Paul Daly (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State Senator Hackett for the debate. The Government will not oppose the motion. I compliment Senator Boyhan on bringing it before the House. It will open up debate on the concept and model for investment, to use his own words. I would like to have this debate but I suppose we are all carrying the scars from the debate we had on the Gresham House concept.

I would be very wary of any forestry fund that would not be specifically geared or aimed towards public-owned land. With any fund, irrespective of whether it is citizens' money, national money, Exchequer money, international money or multinational money, if it is going to buy land, it will tilt the market against farmers. It would also direct them towards Leitrim and that general direction. The competitive land in more aggressive agricultural areas further south would probably be priced out of the market. A fund, irrespective of whether it is Senator Craughwell's €150 or international money, will have to be managed and be profitable. We need to be very careful.

I am not knocking the concept. I agree wholeheartedly with the concept for public land, that being land that is already in the ownership of the State. If it will put people into forestry for profit, it will squeeze the fund that we have and which we all welcomed. We have a national forestry fund of €1.3 billion. It was announced prior to Christmas and is part of the forestry programme. That is the fund we need to manage. It is there to reward the farming community for sowing trees, whether on a very large commercial basis or on 1 ha, and whether it is agroforestry or riparian forestry. The premium has been increased by between 46% and 66% for the farmers. It has been extended for farmer-owned land from 15 years to 20 years. This is how we will have sporadic forestry and how we will save areas such as Leitrim, which is to the fore of all of our minds when we discuss forestry. Leitrim is already 18% afforested and I am fearful that any large quantity of money in any fund, irrespective of who is funding it, would head in that direction again.However, if it is farmer-driven and the €1.3 billion fund is taken up by them, there will be smaller scale forestry sporadically around the country. That is the ideal scenario and all our targets can be through that model. Let it be down to 1 ha per farm; it would help us reach our targets. We need an information and promotion campaign to rebuild the confidence of the farming community. That is something I would like to see coming out of this debate and I have mentioned it previously. Without being negative, we are all aware of and can agree that because of issues over the past few years, there is a lack of confidence in the forestry sector from our farming community. These issues are currently being well managed and moving in a positive direction. I strongly ask that a promotion campaign or advertising campaign would come out of this debate. It could even be a round of town hall-style meetings by Coillte or the Department or whoever, to talk to farmers and show them the advantages and the potential financial gain in getting into forestry even on a small scale. A hectare of Irish native trees can return more than €1,000 per year. Over 20 years that is €20,000 and the crop is still there to be harvested. A lot of people would buy in to that. It does not need to be driven by large-scale funds. However, I would also farmers to be definitively told that they will have the carbon credits for the forestry they sow. This should be coupled, sooner than later, with a proper farm-by-farm inventory of carbon sequestration, including the hedgerows of Ireland, of which there are 300,000 km. I guarantee that an inventory done on any individual small-scale suckler farmer in the west or north west, coupled with the hedgerows and grassland, and which told them the carbon being sequestered, the farmer would add in 1 or more ha of forestry if they got the credit. The day is coming where the funds we are discussing will buy carbon credits, not land for forestry. We need to start that debate now and make sure it will not be funds wheeling and dealing in forestry carbon credits, irrespective of who it is sown by. It needs to be sown and it will be sown. We should couple that debate with this one, and get a definitive answer for the farmers. They would seriously look at planting their hectare plus of forestry were they to gain something from the carbon credits part of the fund. That is the way to go. It should be farmer-driven. The farmers own the land. Should we start any system where someone else is buying the land, there will be consequences down the line.