Michael Fitzmaurice (Roscommon-Galway, Independent)
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201. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the number of forestry planting licences granted from the 1 January 2023 to date; when Ireland formally submitted its completed application for state-aid approval to the EU Commission for its national forestry programme; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [20860/23]

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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The Deputy may be aware that the Government has committed €1.3 billion to the new Forestry Programme, which is the biggest and largest funded Forestry Programme ever introduced by any Government here, and it has been designed to have an emphasis on close to nature forestry and to ensure that farmers will be its primary beneficiaries.

The Forestry Programme 2023 - 2027 is subject to State Aid approval from the EU Commission and is also subject to an ongoing Strategic Environmental Assessment/Appropriate Assessment (SEA/AA) process, which is a critical step in the process of securing State Aid approval.

My Department has been engaging intensively with the Commission over the last few months. This was a necessary process and I am pleased to confirm that the formal State Aid notification for the new Forestry Programme was submitted on 20^thApril. We now await the formal approval of the Commission to the Programme.

Once Commission approval has been received, we will be in a position to launch the new Programme, subject to finalisation of the Strategic Environmental Assessment.

Not all schemes under the Programme require state aid approval under the Guidelines and last week, under the Agricultural Block Exemption Regulation, my Department opened two schemes for applications, the Forest Roads Scheme and the Innovative Forest Technology Scheme – Module 2 Investment Aid for the Development of the Forest Tree Nursery Sector.

It is important to note however, that no new approvals can issue under these or any other schemes until the appropriate environmental processes have been concluded.

All applications currently in the system will continue to be progressed up to the point of approval.

While the Department cannot issue licences for grant-aided afforestation, roads or forestry support schemes until the new Programme is in place, felling licences have continued to issue. To date in 2023, 1,022 felling licences have issued for 12,051 hectares.

In recognition of the need for planting activity to continue, and pending the launch of the new Programme, my Department engaged with the Commission last December to secure an interim solution which has led to the introduction of an Interim Afforestation Scheme (Via General De Minimis), an Interim Forest Road Scheme (via General De Minimis) and an interim Ash Dieback Reconstitution and Underplanting Scheme.

This ensured that those with valid licence approvals issued before the end of 2022, could avail of the current planting season under the higher grant and premium rates proposed to be paid under the new Programme.

To date in 2023, a total of 264 applications have been approved under the interim Afforestation scheme (via general de minimis) representing 1,604 hectares.

The launch of the Forestry Programme 2023-2027 is a matter of the utmost priority for me, Minister of State Pippa Hackett who has overall responsibility for the sector and my Department, as a comprehensive and well-subscribed Forestry Programme has the potential to deliver lasting benefits for climate change, biodiversity, wood production, economic development and quality of life.