Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 24 May 2022
703. Deputy Jackie Cahill asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the number of ash dieback reconstitution and underplanting scheme approvals that his Department will approve in 2022; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [25797/22]
Amharc ar fhreagraI refer the Deputy to his Dáil question number 860 of 29th March, and to question 896 of 5th April that since the first finding of ash dieback disease in Ireland, my Department has provided support totalling over €7 million to owners of ash plantations impacted by disease through the Reconstitution Scheme (Ash Dieback) (introduced in 2013) and more recently the Reconstitution and Underplanting Scheme (RUS – Ash dieback) introduced in July 2020.
Applications for RUS are received regularly, and decisions are issued as the assessment of the applications are completed.
Up until the 20th May, the Department has approved 46 RUS applications to date this year. These approvals are included in the weekly Forestry Licencing Dashboard available here www.gov.ie/en/publication/3b8b5-2022-forestry-weekly-dashboard/.
As the Deputy is likely to be aware, the Forestry Licensing Plan 2022 was published earlier this year and deals with projected licensing output and approvals for support schemes and may be found here gov.ie - gov.ie - Forestry Licensing Plan 2022 (www.gov.ie).
A key target of the plan is to refocus on the delivery on approvals from the Reconstitution and Underplanting Scheme (RUS) (Ash Dieback). However, as the Deputy is aware the 2022 Plan does not include an annual target as many RUS applications are screened in for Appropriate Assessment and are referred to ecology.
Of these, any that propose replacing the ash crop with conifer species currently require planning permission. My Department is continuing to engage positively with the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, who are drafting legislation with the objective of removing the planning permission requirement of broadleaf with conifers on sites under 10 hectares.
