Coillte is a commercial operation as far as I’m aware, of course they’re going to plant the most “commercially viable woodland”. It’s basically a crop. The government would need to change the company if they wanted them to plant more attractive woodland.
I’ve no great love for the conifers, and worse the ugly clear-felling approach that happens when they are cut down, but giving out about a commercial firm planting a commercial crop is missing the point.
Also I can’t understand why Coillte has been prevented from buying lands for new forests for the past 20 years by EU rules around state aid funding, do they want everything privatised and driven for maximum profit in Brussels for even more profits to be funneled to the private sector? Without the pressure to produce as much profit as possible from these lands, biodiversity and sustainablity can be more central to the reforestation efforts. Seems this private sector always first thinking in europe definetly needs to be reformed.
You get a sitka spruce! You get a sitka spruce!
Fuck Coillte
A state owned enterprise facilitating the syphoning of funds intended for rural Ireland to corporate profits is tantamount to treason.
That’s a bit hyperbolic from Irish Wildlife Trust. They were raving about the scheme when it was announced a few months ago. It’s not a scandal. Private capital is being leveraged to purchase land to plant trees. It isn’t much more than that.
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Coillte is a commercial operation as far as I’m aware, of course they’re going to plant the most “commercially viable woodland”. It’s basically a crop. The government would need to change the company if they wanted them to plant more attractive woodland.
I’ve no great love for the conifers, and worse the ugly clear-felling approach that happens when they are cut down, but giving out about a commercial firm planting a commercial crop is missing the point.
Also I can’t understand why Coillte has been prevented from buying lands for new forests for the past 20 years by EU rules around state aid funding, do they want everything privatised and driven for maximum profit in Brussels for even more profits to be funneled to the private sector? Without the pressure to produce as much profit as possible from these lands, biodiversity and sustainablity can be more central to the reforestation efforts. Seems this private sector always first thinking in europe definetly needs to be reformed.
You get a sitka spruce! You get a sitka spruce!
Fuck Coillte
A state owned enterprise facilitating the syphoning of funds intended for rural Ireland to corporate profits is tantamount to treason.
That’s a bit hyperbolic from Irish Wildlife Trust. They were raving about the scheme when it was announced a few months ago. It’s not a scandal. Private capital is being leveraged to purchase land to plant trees. It isn’t much more than that.