Letters

EU red tape and forestry

Blaming the EU for home-grown problems is not helpful

Sat Oct 15 2022 - 00:06

A chara, – The latest opinion piece from John FitzGerald (“EU red tape is hampering our ability to plant forests”, Business, Opinion, October 14th), in which the author suggests relaxing our laws for protected species, comes at a pertinent time. A World Wide Fund for Nature report launched this week finds that wildlife populations have plunged by almost 70 per cent in less than 50 years. Biodiversity is in freefall. It is also the first year that forestry and land use in Finland, that leader in green policies, has become a carbon source rather than a sink.

The EU is committed to tackling both climate and biodiversity crises.

Planting massive, single-species plantations for industrial clear-cutting helps neither. – Is mise,

GRACE O’SULLIVAN,

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Green Party,

MEP for Ireland South,

Tramore,

Co Waterford.

Sir, – John FitzGerald is right to point out that our licensing system for forestry is too onerous and bureaucratic, discouraging afforestation and, in particular, farm forestry. He is also right to advocate that state-level regulation is a better, more pragmatic solution than licensing to ensure compliance with EU environmental regulation.

However, he notes that legal advisers to the Department of Agriculture have “suggested that European law would not permit such a common-sense approach”. Looking at the many EU countries that have adopted just such a common-sense approach, I can only conclude that they engaged smarter lawyers.

As demonstrated by our neighbours across the water, blaming the EU for home-grown problems is not helpful. Instead, our Government should come forward urgently with a pragmatic solution to the licensing debacle so that Ireland can reap the benefits of a substantial forestry programme so clearly set out by John FitzGerald. – Yours, etc,

Dr CORMAC O’CARROLL,

Salzburg,

Austria.