Forest industry sources estimate that 12 million cubic metres of lumber has been knocked by Storm Éowyn.
This equates to six times the annual timber harvest. Lying on the ground, the wood is subject to rot and insect attack thereby significantly reducing its value.
As a private forester, sources indicate that the senior technical forestry staff in the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) are adamant that all felling licences must go through the standard application process, which, as we know, can take up to a year.
For each felling application, an area of 174000ac must be screened to ensure that any river, archaeology, house or wild animal will not be adversely affected.
Thus, if all the trees in St. Stephen's Green in Dublin blew down, an area to just north of Dublin Airport, west to Lucan, south to Bray and three miles into the Irish sea would have to be examined before the foresters running the forest service would grant a licence.
There is a serious question of overreach by the Forest Service with respect to this vast acreage, and the reasoning behind it, which it has resolutely refused to justify to me.
I have an issue with there being no accountability in my opinion and more importantly, staff with a lack experience of working in forestry deciding to allow someone's forest investment deteriorate on the ground due to be bureaucracy.
The Forest Service has form in allowing private forestry to be devalued in the way it manhandled the ash dieback issue.
These issues, as well as the evisceration and destruction of the forest industry and the Forest Service's failure to protect the health of the forest estate by overseeing an exponential rise in tree diseases over the last 25 years, show that a once great Forest Service is no longer fit for purpose, and should be disbanded.
From Richard Romer, Co. Clare