Forest Risk Commodity Regulations

Lord Clark of Windermere Excerpts

Tuesday 12th March 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Clark of Windermere (Lab)]

My Lords, we know that we have fewer trees in this country than most countries in Europe, yet we also know that trees capture CO₂ and other noxious gases. If we are to meet our national obligations to try to reduce global warming, we will have to step up our planting of trees; there is no other way we are going to be able to do it.

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

The noble Lord is absolutely right: we have to practise what we preach domestically, which is why we have put an enormous amount of money through the Nature for Climate fund to promote that and through other schemes. We are encouraging land managers to look at tree planting and are seeing an increased number being planted. The supply chain to support that is so important. I have just come back from Costa Rica, which has doubled its tree cover in recent years, and we want to increase ours significantly in the UK.