Minister of State Pippa Hackett has stated that a review is needed into the drivers of land use change, which squeeze land availability.

The minister pointed to forestry and tillage as two of the sectors most threatened by a heightened demand for land, when speaking at the Energy and Farm Diversification Show in Gurteen Agricultural College on Thursday.

“I think the availability of land is a massive issue and it seems to actually impact every sector, which is ironic because the pressure comes from certain sectors on others, but it has an impact on everyone,” she said in response to a question on land use conflict.

Impact

“It certainly has a significant impact on the land we would like to forest into the future. It just becomes too expensive to buy that land or it is tied into a long-term lease to another farm enterprise. That is a massive challenge.

“[There’s] pressure certainly on tillage land as well from that and different farm enterprises competing for land in certain parts of the country and that’s an issue which really does need to be looked at. We need to look at the drivers of that and the incentives that are behind that as well.”

Teagasc emissions researcher Gary Lanigan stated that a further reduction in derogation stocking rate limits would threaten aspects of farm sustainability like air quality and emissions by boosting the value of land.