Jackie Cahill
Question:737. Deputy Jackie Cahill asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the area of acid sensitive land excluded from afforestation activity; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [39850/23]
View answerWednesday, 20 September 2023
Questions (737)
Written answers
The acid sensitivity protocol, agreed by my Department, the COFORD council and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), defines areas of the country where the underlining geology indicates a limited capacity of surface waters to ‘buffer’ acidification and knock-on impacts on aquatic ecosystems, especially the hatching of salmonids. These Acid Sensitive Areas amount to a total of 601,660 hectares.
In such areas, ions absorbed by conifer canopies from the atmosphere can wash into surface waters, thereby increasing acidification. In response, the aforementioned protocol requires the sampling of receiving waters to gauge their inherent buffering capacity, with a threshold set that rules out afforestation with conifers.
However, afforestation with native woodlands within the designated areas does not fall under this protocol. This is due to the limited contribution native woodlands make to surface water acidification (for various reasons, including their predominantly deciduous nature), and the wealth of ecosystem services such woodlands deliver.
This measure was agreed with the EPA in 2013 (as per my Department's Forestry Circular 4 of 2013) and remains in place. It has also been applied to the creation of new agro-forestry within these acid-sensitive areas. As a result, those Forest Types available under the new Forestry Programme and involving the creation, through afforestation, of new native woodland and new agro-forestry do not fall under the acid sensitivity protocol. This creates various opportunities for farmers and other landowners within these acid-sensitive areas to engage in afforestation.
Question No. 738 answered with Question No. 735.
Question No. 739 answered with Question No. 735.