Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 3 October 2023
504. Deputy Holly Cairns asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the number of staff in the forestry services who are authorised to sign off on environmental impact assessment reports, by grade, in tabular form. [42699/23]
View answer505. Deputy Holly Cairns asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the number of environmental impact assessment reports received by the forestry service; and the number of reports processed by the service, from 2022 to date, in tabular form. [42700/23]
View answer506. Deputy Holly Cairns asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the number of staff in the forestry service who are authorised to sign off on environmental reports for impacts to bird species, by grade, in tabular form. [42701/23]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 504, 505 and 506 together.
Within my Department, the Forestry Inspectorate assessed the technical aspects of forestry licence and scheme applications. Currently within the Forestry Inspectorate there are a total of 65 permanent professional/technical staff, 56 of whom have a role in licencing either directly or by providing support functions. These include forestry inspectors, archaeologists, ecologists and engineers. In addition, my Department employs a number of ecology companies to assist with files that require ecology input. The breakdown of the permanent staff within the Forestry Inspectorate Division who are involved in licensing forestry files is as follows:
|
Forestry Inspectorate professional /technical staff with an involvement in licensing |
No. |
|
Senior Inspector |
1 |
|
Forestry Inspector Grade 1 (Ecologist) |
1 |
|
Forestry Inspector Grade 1 (Archaeologist) |
1 |
|
Forestry Inspector Grade 1 |
5 |
|
Forestry Inspector Grade 2 |
8 |
|
Forestry Inspector Grade 3 |
27 |
|
AAI (Ecologist) |
6 |
|
Ecologist Grade 3 |
1 |
|
Archaeologist Grade 3 |
4 |
|
Engineer Grade 3 |
2 |
All forestry Inspectors and all ecologists have a role in the protection of birds species. Bird reports provided to the Department as part of an application vary in nature and complexity. Some can be dealt with by Forestry Inspectors while those requiring a judgement around the significance of planting on certain bird species will normally be referred to an ecologist. The Forestry Inspectors are the licensing Inspectors and they must satisfy themselves that all issues including the protection of birds are dealt with in accordance with DAFM procedures before certifying the file.
In relation to Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), any afforestation project of 50 hectares or greater in size requires a mandatory Environmental Impact Assessment Report (EIAR) and any forest road development two kilometres or more in size requires a mandatory EIAR from the applicant. In addition, all afforestation applications and all forest road applications are subject to a screening for a sub threshold EIA. This is carried out by the 20 District Inspectors and the two Regional Inspectors. The breakdown of their role, grades and numbers are as follows.
|
Role (Grade) |
No. |
|
Regional Inspector (Forestry Inspector Grade 1) |
2 |
|
District Inspector (Forestry Inspector Grade 2) |
6 |
|
District Inspector (Forestry Inspector Grade 3) |
14 |
My Department received one EIAR in 2022, which is still being processed and my Department has not received an EIAR in 2023.
While all forestry Inspectors, ecologists and archaeologists working on applications are authorosed officers under the Forestry Act 2014 there is no requirement to be formally authorised to sign off on an EIA, so there is therefore no such list. A multi-disciplinary team within my Department led by a Forestry Inspector Grade 1 examines any EIAR submitted
