The 20-year forestry premiums paid to farmers should be disbursed over 10 years, and the Government should have the option to buy the timber at market value at the time of harvesting, a major review of the Forestry Development Strategy has proposed. Seán MacConnell, Agriculture Correspondent, reports.
The review, carried out by Peter Bacon and Associates, recommends that compressing the payment period by half and giving the Government an option to buy the crop, could bring annual forestry plantings up to target and vitalise the industry.
But yesterday the IFA's farm forestry chairman, Mr John Jackson, rejected any attempt to give the State compulsory purchase rights on timber after 10 years.
"This would mean the State would then sell on the timber to public or private investors at a profit, but the farmer would be left with land on which he could generate no income for 30 years and thewould be stuck with the replanting costs," he said.
He added that reducing the premium term from 20 to 10 years would not work because the farmer would suffer a collapse in income from the 11th year.
A target planting of 20,000 hectares per annum was outlined in 1996 but never achieved, the report said, and annual planting in 1996-2003 was only 14,000 hectares.
In addition, the report found, the targeted species mix of hard and softwoods had not been achieved, even though the situation had started to improve. But the scale of plantations was small.
Dealing with other criticisms, the report said the prospective range of log sizes and species was inadequate to meet market demands, and there were deficiencies in the information available to guide planning in the private sector.
It continued: "Forest management practices are often poor, particularly with respect to broadleaf species, and private sector thinning will be well short of its potential. There are also data deficiencies when it comes to assessments of non-timber benefits of forestry."
The report said forestry policy would need to see a revision of the view that forestry support payments were provided primarily as supplements to farm income supports.
It proposed a programme of planting 20,000 hectares per annum with a reviewed premium payment which would see the payment period drop from 20 to 10 years, with the annual payment increased to keep the present value of the payments constant.
It estimated the total funding requirement for such a programme at €6,950 million in the period 2005-54.
Recommending this strategy, the report said that in addition to reducing the State's liability while protecting the present value of payments, this would be in line with the direction of EU policy and provide for the introduction of initiatives to encourage better management of crops and access to timber by investment firms at a later date.
Dealing with the State option to buy the timber from the grower when premium payments had expired, the report said this would protect the State's investment and generate €655 million.
It estimated that about 3,780 people were employed in forest crop establishment and harvesting, and 6,000 in timber processing. Research suggested that every five jobs created directly in forestry supported an additional three jobs indirectly.
The report said that the non-timber benefits of forestry had never been properly estimated and these included the recreation and carbon sequestration worth €75 million per annum.