asked the Minister for Fisheries and Forestry if his Department has any plans for the erection of a timber processing plant in County Donegal.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - County Donegal Timber Processing Plant.
13.
The industrial potential of the timber supply from State forests generally, with particular reference to the North Western region, is being examined but as yet no specific plans on the lines indicated in the question have materialised.
Would the Minister accept that there is now sufficient raw material in Donegal to justify setting up a plant there?
I am sure there is not at the moment. We have two major pulp wood using facilities in the industrial sector. We are committed by contract to supply these two facilities with certain volumes of timber. The increase in the volume of pulp wood goes on year after year. Growth looks after that. At the moment we are in between times, if the Deputy knows what I mean. We are not in a position to provide sufficient volumes of pulp wood for the kind of third facility which would be necessary. I am told that by the end of the decade we will have a sufficient volume of pulp wood for the kind of facility. This matter is under active consideration. It takes time and we have to prepare ourselves for that eventuality. It is felt that by the end of the decade we will have sufficient supplies to have a third facility.
Will the Minister have a more intensive study carried out into the feasibility of providing a mill in Donegal as soon as the raw material comes on stream? In Donegal we cannot accept that we are continuing to export the raw material from the county when within the next few years we will have sufficient pulp wood for a facility of our own. I will not ask the Minister to commit himself to providing a plant there by the end of the decade, because I am fully aware he will not be in the Department by the end of the decade.
In general terms the north-west area is being looked at and will be the location for a third facility. There is a place in the north-west called east Mayo in case the Deputy forgets.
We will decide where it will go. We will be in Government.