The private forestry sector united in protest today (Wednesday, October 3) to demand greater intervention from government to help solve the ongoing "crisis" in the sector.

About 100 members of the Social, Economic, Environmental Forestry Association of Ireland (SEEFA) gathered outside government buildings to call on the Department of the Taoiseach to intervene as "all other options have failed".

"With over 1,000 afforestation applications and thousands of felling and road-licence applications still awaiting a decision from government, SEEFA is highlighting the severe social, economic and environmental impact of this crisis," the organisation said in a statement.

Government delays in granting licences is forcing imports of timber - while Irish trees cannot be planted or felled - and threatening 12,000 industry jobs, SEEFA has said.

SEEFA members met with a number of government TDs this week to outline the sector's problems and propose a number of solutions.

They are calling for five solutions to be implemented without delay:

Meanwhile, as the SEEFA protest was getting underway, Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM), Pippa Hackett, who has responsibility for forestry, issued a statement.

In it, the minister said that 2021 will see the "highest ever volume of timber licenced for harvest".

However, she added that she is aware that an "urgent uplift" in afforestation licences is needed.

"My department will soon be producing its projections for licencing for the first half of 2022,” the minister said.