Government seven years behind tree planting targets

The target of planting 11 million trees in the 2015-2020 parliamentary term has been repeated regularly by successive Cabinet ministers, including Andrea Leadsom, Secretary of State for the Environment, and her predecessor Elizabeth Truss.

However, latest Forestry Commission statistics show just 1.35 million trees have been planted since the Conservative Government came to office in the May 2015 election - an average of 75,166 trees per month.

"At that rate, it will take 12.2 years, taking us into late summer 2027, before the target is hit," said Confor's Chief Executive Stuart Goodall. "This simply isn't good enough and much more needs to be done.

"We are very heartened by the recent announcement of the £19 million Woodland Carbon Fund - and the fact that it is targeted at schemes of more than 30 hectares. It is larger-scale planting that will really make a difference in hitting the target as well as delivering a wide range of economic, environmental and social benefits to our rural communities. We really encourage the industry to support this scheme and get more trees in the ground."

Mr Goodall added: "The more fundamental problem is what is described in the planting figures as 'a slower uptake of the new grant' under the Countryside Stewardship scheme. Confor and others warned that the scheme would be cumbersome and unattractive and that proved to be the case.

Planting rates are calculated over three-month periods: January-March, April-June, July-September and October-December. The calculation includes April-June 2015, which covers around five weeks before the current Government took office.