Sixty-four per cent of applications made in 2021 for tree-felling licences came from Coillte, according to data released by the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM).
In response to a written parliamentary question by Fine Gael TD, Colm Burke, the department noted that it received 3,601 applications for tree-felling licences last year.
Almost 64% – 2,299 – were submitted by Coillte, while 36% or 1,309 applications came from private forestry owners.
The DAFM outlined that Coillte, Ireland’s state forestry company, is responsible for much of the mature national forest estate and supplies 75% of logs to sawmills.
Tree-felling licences
In his parliamentary questions, Deputy Burke asked the department for a breakdown of the number of licences that were issued by county for both felling and afforestation since 2019.
The DAFM said that 2,873 tree-felling licences were issued last year; 1,532 to Coillte and 1,341 to private owners.
The total number of licences issued was a 40% increase on 2020 when 1,717 were given – 865 to Coillte and 852 to private owners.
However, that was a significant decline from the 2019 total of 4,180; that year Coillte was issued with 3,134 felling licences and private operators got 1,046.
Last year, the county issued with the highest number of felling licences was Cork with 330, followed by 286 in Tipperary and 215 in Wicklow.
In the first month of 2022, the department issued 150 felling licences to Coillte and 143 to private owners.
Meanwhile, DAFM said that 502 afforestation licences were issued in 2021 – 496 were given to private owners and six to Coillte.
Forty-nine licences related to tree planting in Mayo, 46 were for Cork and there were 40 each for counties Roscommon and Leitrim.
During January of this year, all of the 64 afforestation licences were issued to private individuals or companies.
