Jackie Cahill (Tipperary, Fianna Fail)
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2515. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the reason the ecology section on the weekly dashboard was removed in April 2021; if it will be reinstated without delay; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [19640/21]

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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When the Project Management Unit was set up to deal with the applications referred to Ecology, targets were established for outputs from Ecology Unit to end February only. Since then, Project Woodland has been established.

Project Woodland, under the leadership of Minister of State Hackett, who has responsibility for forestry, is an initiative to tackle issues in forestry in Ireland and to promote and encourage woodland creation. It involves four different Working Groups which work concurrently, focussing on different areas. The first is concentrating on the backlog, the second on a vision for forestry, the third on devising a fit-for-purpose organisational structure and communications, and the fourth on streamlining the licensing process for the future. Each Working Group is made up of stakeholders drawn from the Minister’s existing Forestry Policy Group and is chaired by an independent, experienced outsider.

The first Working Group is tasked with defining and agreeing targets for the backlog, which will be incorporated into the remit for the third working group, which is to draft a Customer Charter. Part of this, will be to set out new targets for licence deliverables, including the output of the Ecology unit. These working groups will continue with their tasks over the coming months. However, in the meantime, the decision has already been taken to include the Ecology output graph in the Forestry Dashboard. It has been re-instated in the most recent Dashboard which issued on 19th April, 2021.

I am committed, along with Minister Hackett, to the success of Project Woodland which aims to deliver increased output for the benefit of the sector and society at large.