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Written Question
Trees: Conservation
Monday 22nd May 2023

Asked by: Julian Knight (Independent - Solihull)

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what funding her Department is providing for research into ways to increase tree numbers outside of woodlands.

Answered by Trudy Harrison

Over this Parliament, we will have invested over £6.5 million in research into trees outside woodlands, including agroforestry. This includes a partnership with the Tree Council, Natural England and five local councils, testing and developing innovative and sustainable new ways to increase tree cover outside woodlands. The first phase has planted more than 121,000 trees and demonstrated ways to reduce costs of establishment. Phase 2 will further research the effectiveness of tree planting methods and approaches in non-woodland areas, so that more, healthier trees can be planted in these areas in future. This work has informed the approaches funded through Coronation Woods, announced to mark the King’s Coronation, which will see tree planting in community orchards, small areas of woodland, and ‘tree handouts’ – supplying trees to local residents to plant in areas of their choosing. The Trees Outside Woodland project will evaluate the effectiveness of this scheme as part of its programme of research.

We are collaborating on the £15.6 million multidisciplinary Future of UK Treescapes programme which is funding several projects investigating Trees Outside of Woods. Separately, five of the tests and trials for our new environmental land management schemes on farms are exploring approaches to agroforestry. This includes the Organic Research Centre working with 250 farmers to look at the incentives and advice required for farmers to incorporate agroforestry practices. Interim Findings show that awareness is an issue and that incentives need to reflect the long-term nature of the commitment.


Written Question
Phytophthora Ramorum: Disease Control
Tuesday 21st March 2023

Asked by: Lord Bishop of St Albans (Bishops - Bishops)

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have to limit the spread of Phytophthora ramorum in trees in England.

Answered by Lord Benyon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)

Phytophthora ramorum is primarily distributed across the western regions of GB affecting larch plantations. For over twelve years we have had a robust management programme in place, including aerial and ground-based surveillance and risk-based inspections at nurseries and retail sites. Scotland and Wales have their own management programmes.

Where it is found, given the economic impact of the disease to the forestry industry, Statutory Plant Health Notices are served requiring the destruction of infected trees and those nearby. Specific measures are taken related to the handling, movement and processing of larch infected with P. ramorum, to prevent the spread through the trade in timber and related products.

Government guidance and grants are available through Countryside Stewardship for restocking woodland post P. ramorum infection, and for the removal of immature larch and rhododendron. Further financial support is available through the tree health pilot, which aims to test further support for land managers, including farmers, so they can act against tree pests and diseases which attack our trees, woods, and forests.


Written Question
Forests and Trees: Conservation
Thursday 16th March 2023

Asked by: Lord Foster of Bath (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to their Tree health resilience strategy, published on 25 May 2018, what progress they have made in each year since 2018 in respect of the goals they identified to improve the (1) extent, (2) connectivity, (3) diversity, and (4) condition, of trees, woods and forests in England.

Answered by Lord Benyon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)

The Forestry Commission publish annual statistical reports on Key Performance Indicators. Since 2020, these reports have included data on the extent and net change in woodland area, the connectivity of woodland, and the ecological condition (including the age and species diversity) of woodlands in England.

The latest available report (published June 2022) shows a marginal increase in woodland area, an improvement in net change and little change in connectivity for the last five years of published data. The condition and diversity indicators do not yet have a time series covering five years.

Through the England Trees Action Plan, we committed to treble tree planting rates in England by the end of this Parliament. This commitment, supported by the £640m Nature for Climate Fund, is helping the sector to deliver more resilient trees, woods and forests. The Countryside Stewardship scheme and the tree health pilot scheme also provide financial support for removal of diseased trees and restocking of trees.


Written Question
Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs: Public Expenditure
Wednesday 2nd November 2022

Asked by: Alex Sobel (Labour (Co-op) - Leeds North West)

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how much funding (a) his Department allocated to and (b) was spent by the (i) Woodland Carbon Guarantee scheme, (ii) Woods into Management Forestry Innovation Funds, (iii) Tree Production Innovation Fund, (iv) Local Authority Treescapes Fund , (v) Urban Tree Challenge Fund, (vi) Tree Production Capital Grant, (vii) England Woodland Creation Offer, (viii) Woodland Creation Accelerator Fund and (ix) Trees Call to Action Fund in each year since 2010; and how much funding his Department has allocated to each project in each of the next five years.

Answered by Trudy Harrison

The £640 million Nature for Climate Fund will support peat restoration, woodland creation and management until 2025. Nature for Climate Fund deployment in future years is dependent on analysis of previous year’s performance across projects and workstreams. The table below provides the grant allocation and spend with in-year adjustments. All grants are capital monies aside from the woodland creation accelerator fund, which is revenue.

Grant or funding

2020-21 allocation

2020-21 spend

2021-22 allocation

2021-22 spend

2022-23 and 2024-25 allocation

(£000)

Woodland Carbon Guarantee1

Woods into Management Forestry Innovation Funds

685

447

7,596

Tree Production Innovation Fund

1,000

879

4,700

Local Authority Treescapes Fund

4,410

3,551

25,514

Urban Tree Challenge Fund

2,670

2,128

4,103

3,252

34,339

Tree Production Capital Grant

8,475

England Woodland Creation Offer2

7,763

2,694

88,528

Woodland Creation Accelerator Fund

9,760

Trees Call to Action Fund

5,000

5,000

4,550

1 The Woodland Carbon Guarantee is a £50 million scheme that aims to help accelerate woodland planting rates and develop the domestic market for woodland carbon for the permanent removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. The Woodland Carbon Guarantee applicants can sell their carbon credits to the government at a future date set in the future for a guaranteed price. There is no obligation to sell and they can do so only starting in 2025.

2 England Woodland Creation Offer includes the Woodland Creation Planning Grant and Woodland Carbon Fund


Written Question
Tree Preservation Orders
Friday 16th July 2021

Asked by: Catherine West (Labour - Hornsey and Wood Green)

Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what recent assessment he has made of the effectiveness of Tree Preservation Orders; and whether the Government has plans to bring forward additional legislative proposals to improve the protection of trees and woods in urban areas.

Answered by Christopher Pincher

Tree Preservation Orders are issued and enforced by local authorities, who have responsibility for ensuring trees of amenity value are protected for their community's enjoyment. The Government strongly believes in protecting our natural environment, which is why we increased protection for Ancient and Veteran trees in the National Planning Policy Framework in 2018 and are the first Government to commit to leaving the natural environment in a better state then we inherited it.

The England Tree Action Plan set out the Government's long-term vision for trees and acknowledged the role of strong regulation in protecting and sustainably managing our existing tree and woodland cover. We are committed to ensuring that our future planning reforms will lead to more trees being planted and ensure strong protections for existing trees, which will benefit all areas of the country, including urban areas.


Written Question
Trees: Conservation
Monday 28th June 2021

Asked by: Lord Patten (Conservative - Life peer)

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the need, if any, to improve the protection of ancient and veteran trees in England.

Answered by Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park

The irreplaceable nature of ancient and veteran trees and woodland is recognised in our 25 Year Environment Plan. We therefore strengthened the protection of ancient and veteran trees through the National Planning Policy Framework and guidance to planners. These outline that developments should be refused if they would lead to the loss and deterioration of ancient and veteran trees, unless there are wholly exceptional reasons and suitable compensation measures.

In 2019, we announced that Government would give the Woodland Trust £210,000 to work with Natural England to update the Ancient Woodland Inventory which identifies over 53,000 ancient woodland sites in England. Having an up-to-date inventory will make it easier for us all to protect this important habitat. Updates to the Ancient Woodland Inventory will also seek to identify further ancient wood pasture sites, which contain a significant number of ancient and veteran trees. By adding these sites to the inventory, we will strengthen the protection of ancient and veteran trees in England.

On 18 May we published the England Trees Action Plan which set out our long-term vision for trees, including for ancient and veteran trees. We announced a number of measures to improve protection of our ancient and veteran trees.

  • Introducing a new category of Long-Established Woodland. These are woodlands that have been in situ since 1840. We will consult on the protections these woodlands are afforded in the planning system, recognising their high ecological and societal value.
  • We will update the Ancient Woodland Inventory to review the whole of England. This will include mapping smaller ancient woodland sites down to 0.25 hectares in size. The original inventory only mapped sites down to 2 hectares, missing many smaller woods which are important for landscape-scale habitat connectivity.
  • We will also update the Keepers of Time policy on management of ancient woodland, veteran trees, and other semi natural woodland.

Written Question
Trees
Thursday 29th April 2021

Asked by: Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (Green Party - Life peer)

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the report by the Woodland Trust State of the UK's Woods and Trees 2021, published on 14 April; and what steps they are taking to ensure that there is sufficient UK and Ireland Sourced and Grown trees to meet demand.

Answered by Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park

The Government welcomes the State of the UK’s Woods and Trees 2021 report which is the first to present important facts and trends focusing predominantly on native woods and trees, and trees in towns and cities within the UK.

We are working to increase tree production in our domestic nursery sector. This will build on current facilities and explore innovative ideas and technologies to improve production capacity. This is necessary to create a resilient, healthy, and genetically diverse planting stock, which is ready for our future climate. We have taken a number of steps to ensure domestically sourced and grown trees meet demand:

  • Supporting activities to enhance production, processing and supply of UK tree seeds from a wider range of species and provenances.
  • Transforming Forestry England seed processing and nursery facilities, at the same time providing capital grants to allow private nurseries to enhance productivity.
  • Working with the industry to increase the uptake of the ‘Plant Healthy’ assurance scheme which helps improve biosecurity and reduce the risk of planting unhealthy stock.

Over the last three years, 100 percent of trees planted by Forestry England are UK grown, meaning all trees supplied to Natural Resources Wales and Forestry and Land Scotland are UK grown.


Written Question
Agriculture: Forests
Thursday 29th April 2021

Asked by: Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (Green Party - Life peer)

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the report by the Woodland Trust State of the UK's Woods and Trees 2021, published on 14 April, what plans they have to promote agroforestry, particularly the growing of fruit and nut crops; what assessment they have made of the impact of such promotion on (1) the level of food security, (2) the quality of diets, (3) fodder crops for animals, (4) the diversion to animals of food that could be eaten by humans, and (5) the use of anthelmintics.

Answered by Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park

Agroforestry has a significant role in helping the Government commitment to increase tree planting across the UK to 30,000 hectares per year by 2025, in line with the annual rate recommended by the Committee on Climate Change in 2019 to help us meet net zero. We know our mechanisms for woodland creation must be more wide reaching and bold. This requires a transformative change for government and the sector. That is why the Nature for Climate Fund announced in the March 2020 Budget provides significant funding for tree planting, including agroforestry systems. The Committee on Climate Change has also recommended agroforestry on 10% of arable and grassland by 2050 to contribute to net zero emissions targets.

We know that agroforestry systems can play an important role in addressing some of the key issues of climate and land use change in England, through the wide range of ecosystem services it provides.

  • Providing food, fuel, fodder, timber, shade
  • Regulating soil, water, air quality and sequester carbon
  • Improving animal health and welfare
  • Supporting biodiversity and habitat creation

Written Question
Tree Planting: Urban Areas
Tuesday 16th March 2021

Asked by: Catherine West (Labour - Hornsey and Wood Green)

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps his Department are taking to encourage tree planting in urban areas.

Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

We are committed to increasing tree planting and are setting out policies to achieve this in the Government’s action plan on trees, including planting and protecting trees in and around urban areas. We are already delivering on this through:

  • £80 million of charity-led projects funded through the Green Recovery Challenge Fund, the first round of which supported a wide range of projects to protect, restore and connect people with nature, including a national street tree sponsorship scheme and tree planting around the NHS estate.
  • The £10 million Urban Tree Challenge Fund, supporting planting of up to 134,000 trees, including 20,000 street trees.
  • £12.1 million investment in England's ten Community Forests to create high quality, accessible woodlands around towns and cities.
  • £2.5 million to pilot innovative means to grow trees outside woods, in partnership with Local Authorities.

This complements wider support for urban greening through:

  • Creation of a Nature Recovery Network, connecting wildlife-rich places across our towns, cities and countryside.
  • Development of a National Framework of Green Infrastructure Standards to help local authorities, developers and communities to improve greening provision.
  • Designing and investing in healthy places to live and work through the forthcoming National Model Design Code, Towns Fund and new £4 billion Levelling Up Fund.

Written Question
Tree Planting: Urban Areas
Friday 15th January 2021

Asked by: Helen Hayes (Labour - Dulwich and West Norwood)

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to increase rates of tree-planting and urban greening in metropolitan areas.

Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

We are committed to increasing tree planting and will set out policies to achieve this in the England Tree Strategy, including planting and protecting trees in and around urban areas, which are vital to creating healthy places to live. We are already delivering on this through:

  • £80m of charity-led projects funded through the Green Recovery Challenge Fund, the first round of which supported a wide range of projects to protect, restore and connect people with nature, including a national street tree sponsorship scheme and tree planting around the NHS estate.
  • £10m Urban Tree Challenge Fund, supporting planting of up to 134,000 trees, including 20,000 street trees.
  • £12.1m investment in England’s ten Community Forests to create high quality, accessible woodlands around towns and cities.
  • £2.5m to pilot innovative means to grow trees outside woods, in partnership with Local Authorities.

This complements wider support for urban greening through:

  • Creation of a Nature Recovery Network, connecting wildlife-rich places across our towns, cities and countryside.
  • Development of a National Framework of Green Infrastructure Standards to help local authorities, developers and communities to improve greening provision.
  • Designing and investing in healthy places to live and work through the forthcoming National Model Design Code, Towns Fund and new £4bn Levelling Up Fund.