Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

597. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the length of time that it took his Department to process each of the 11 afforestation licences on week four of October 2022 on the weekly dashboard; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [56102/22]

Michael Fitzmaurice (Roscommon-Galway, Independent)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

600. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the estimated cost of ecology input for the 11 afforestation licences issued on week number four of October's dashboard; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [56135/22]

Matt Shanahan (Waterford, Independent)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

620. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if he will confirm the number of ecologists involved in processing the 11 afforestation licences on week four of October 2022; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [56599/22]

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I propose to take Questions Nos. 597, 600 and 620 together.

I am pleased to advise that this year we have seen considerable improvements in the issuance of forestry licences and a large decrease in the files with the Department.

We are issuing significantly more afforestation licences (621 year to date) than applications received (359 year to date), and this means that the backlog continues to drop, with faster turnaround times for new applicants.

The production of licences is a team effort and requires administrative staff, forestry Inspectors and when required archaeologists and ecologists. It is estimated that ecologists are involved in 75% to 80% of all files issued.

DAFM has issued 93 licences on average each week this year. On the basis that 75% of these had an ecologist input approximately 70 files per week had ecology input.

In relation to afforestation the pace of processing of these applications has picked up significantly, since increased ecological resources have been recruited with 238 licences processed in the 3rd quarter of this year, compared to 131 in the second quarter.

Taking account of all forestry licence types the average cost per file licensed that had ecology input is approximately €650 per file in 2022.

In relation to the 11 Afforestation licences on the dashboard for week 4 of October, there were 7 different DAFM ecologists involved and the turn-around times were as follows:

Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

598. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the actual applications versus the phased projected monthly plan for licence and scheme applications in his Department’s plan for the month of October 2022 for Coillte felling, private felling, roads, afforestation and Ash dieback RUS in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [56109/22]

Michael Fitzmaurice (Roscommon-Galway, Independent)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

602. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if the processing and issuing of licence and scheme approvals for the month of October 2022 is in line with his Department's phased plan for the same period; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [56137/22]

Matt Shanahan (Waterford, Independent)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

619. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the details of the actual output versus the phased projected monthly plan for licence and scheme approvals in his Department's plan for October 2022 for Coillte felling, private felling, roads, afforestation, Ash dieback RUS; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [56598/22]

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I propose to take Questions Nos. 598, 602 and 619 together.

In October, the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine has issued, 120 private felling, 123 Coillte felling, 55 afforestation and 54 roads applications. 22 RUS applications have been processed also.

In addition, at 11th November 2022, there were 975 approved afforestation contracts with 7,243 ha that have not yet been planted.

There is an overall significant increase across all licensing categories in the year to date compared with last year. Up to 11th November, we have issued 4,176 licences, just behind the projected target of 4,545. In fact, in the 12 months from October 2021 to the end of October 2022 my Department has delivered 4,832 licences.

In terms of our targets in the year-to date, we are at 92% of our target for roads, 89% for private felling and over 100% for Coillte felling. Afforestation figures are 69% of year-to-date target. We continue to focus an intensive effort to clear older files ahead of the new forestry programme which was recently announced.

As regards RUS, while we committed in our Licensing Plan to increasing output this year, the Plan does not include an annual target as many RUS applications are screened in for Appropriate Assessment. There are 538 applications currently in the system and any applications that propose replacing the ash crop with conifer species currently require planning permission.

The introduction of the legislation to remove the requirement for planning permission for RUS projects of less than 10 ha in size is a matter for the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage. An Appropriate Assessment screening process is also currently being undertaken in parallel by the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage’s Ecological Assessment Unit. I am hopeful that the legislation can be introduced once their Environmental screening processes have been finalised.

The following table outlines applications received and licence output vs target in each of the licensing categories, as well as RUS applications received and issued.

To 11th November

In the interest of full transparency, details of all licences issued by category are available on my Department's weekly dashboard. This is published on the Departmental website and is made available to all interested parties, as well as being submitted to the Joint Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine each week.