Good progress at Foresight Sustainable Forestry – The purchase of Foresight Sustainable Forestry’s seed assets portfolio is said to be progressing and is expected to complete next month. The line-up of assets that the fund plans to buy has been tweaked so that the portfolio should comprise 26 assets in total (covering 8,000 hectares) including Banc Farm, Rorie Hill and Auchenbrack. The company will have more exposure to afforestation (tree-planting) projects.
Banc Farm
This morning, the company said that Blackmead Forestry Limited, which it has an option to acquire, has received full planning approval and confirmation of grant funding for the Banc Farm afforestation scheme. The site has now commenced planting.
Banc Farm consists of 149.5 hectares in Camarthenshire. The plan is to plant trees on 90.8 hectares of that. Planting has started this month and is expected to take 6-8 weeks to complete. Once complete, there will be a new forest of about 229,000 trees. Three-quarters of these will be commercial conifers, and this is forecast to deliver 48,153 tonnes of sustainable timber production for each c.35-year rotation. The scheme appears on the UK Land Carbon Registry and is already registered with the Woodland Carbon Code (WCC). Once planting has been completed, the process for full accreditation and award of the carbon units by the WCC can take place. Once fully established, the site is expected to sequester 21,218 tonnes of CO2, and generate associated voluntary carbon credits.
Foresight Sustainable Forestry highlights that Wales is one of the least forested countries in Europe (only about 14.5% of land area tree covered in 2020). Most (around 80%) of timber used in the country is imported from outside the UK. The Welsh Government wants to plant at least 2,000 hectares of forest each year, and aims to increase this to 4,000 hectares as rapidly as possible from 2020-2050. The Welsh Government’s overall aim is to increase Welsh tree cover to between 17.8% and 20.7% by 2050. Banc Farm afforestation makes about a 4.5% contribution to the Welsh Government’s 2022 woodland creation target.
Diverse and some endangered species
The planting scheme at Banc Farm comprises 50% Sitka Spruce, 15% Douglas Fir, 10% Norway Spruce, 10% Silver Birch, 10% Sycamore and 5% Oak and tree species that are designated as rare and endangered. The planting of 350 Black Poplar trees, recognised by the Forestry Commission as one of the UK’s rarest native species, is expected to increase the total UK population of the tree species by about 5%. The rare and endangered tree planting also includes 1,500 Holm Oak and 300 Juniper trees, both of which are on the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s ‘Red List’. The project also involves the restoration of 25 hectares of non-commercial native oak woodland by re-introducing the rotational coppicing of selected trees, the introduction of mountain biking trails, and the construction of a car park for visitors. Banc Farm will see the creation of 25-30 jobs for the local community during the first year from planting commencing.
An independent ecologist has been appointed to confirm the bio-diversity improvement achieved by the Banc Farm afforestation scheme. Using DEFRA’s Biodiversity Metric 3.0, the scheme will improve Banc Farm’s baseline biodiversity habitat unit value by 60% over the next five years.
FSF : Good progress at Foresight Sustainable Forestry