Highland MSP Fergus Ewing – who is member for Inverness and Nairn, and also the Scottish Government's cabinet secretary for rural economy – welcomes Scottish Forestry's continued efforts to push for tree planting target despite impact of Covid-19 coronavirus lockdown
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NEW tree planting in Scotland is continuing apace despite the impact of Covid-19 restrictions – although a target for 12,000 new hectares is now "just out of reach".
New figures published today show that despite the Covid-19 challenges, Scotland delivered over 80 per cent of all new tree planting in the UK.
In total, 10,860 hectares of new woodland were planted, the second highest level since 2001. That means that nearly 22 million more trees were planted in Scotland last year.
But Covid-19 and prolonged bad weather meant significant disruption to the planting season and put the new target of 12,000 hectares just out of reach.
However, with tree planting able to get back on track in Phase 1 of the route map out of lockdown, Scottish Forestry said progress "is being made", with forestry grant approvals for 2020/21 already covering 9000 hectares, with a further 7,000 hectares of applications being worked on.
Commenting on the figures, Rural Economy Secretary Fergus Ewing said: “This is an outstanding result, in what were really difficult circumstances. A very wet winter slowed planting which then came to a stop as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. That was the right approach. No target is worth pursuing if it puts people’s lives at risk.
“So we should celebrate and welcome this achievement. Scotland has produced the second highest planting figure in nearly 20 years and again exceeding our original planting target. This is really positive news.
“We also know that there is a healthy number of woodland creation proposals coming forward. That is important, not only because of the contribution forestry makes to the rural economy, but also for the role it plays in providing essential supplies for the wider economy. That was demonstrated during the pandemic with timber being supplied for construction and maintenance in NHS facilities and for pallets for distributing medical and food supplies.
“Forestry will also have a key role to play in our Green Recovery, with productive conifers and native woodland helping to lock in carbon as we continue to strive to reduce our emissions to net zero.
”I pay tribute to the staff of Scottish Forestry in delivery of these results despite Covid-19. This shows home working can be used successfully, a lesson we will heed going forward.”
The yearly target for native woodland creation was achieved with 4529 hectares being created – around 42 per cent of all the new woodland in Scotland.
Scotland’s forests cover 18.8 per cent of the total land mass area and the Scottish Government’s forestry strategy is aiming to increase this to 21 per cent by 2032.
The Scottish Government, as part of their climate change commitments, has already upped the planting targets for the future, rising to 15,000 hectares a year from 2024/25.
