Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 4:07 pm on 25 June 2019.
Thank you, Joyce Watson, for that series of questions and observations. Just talking about smallholdings, when I came into portfolio three years ago, I was very keen to do a piece of work with local authorities around the number of smallholdings that were being sold off. I understood they were doing them quite often because of financial pressures, however once that smallholding is lost, it's lost forever, particularly if it's sold, obviously, for house building, for instance. So, I think we have seen a smaller number of smallholdings being sold off. I'm not aware of the particular one you mentioned, but I will certainly look into that.
I think the point you raised about importing—. I gave the example of importing coal for steel making and how it would be wrong for us, I believe, as a globally responsible country to import steel, but I think you took it down to an individual level, which I think is really important, and the choices we make around our purchases, for instance. I think once of the reasons for declaring a climate emergency was to galvanise people into action and it wasn't just governance, it wasn't just local authorities, it wasn't just businesses; it was individuals as well. I think that you've given a very good example of how people, when they're purchasing anything, do it from a sustainable point of view.
You mentioned woodland, and new planting has been shown to give considerable gains in carbon sequestration, which is why we have now committed to planting 2,000 hectares a year from 2020 to 2030. We've also linked our Glastir woodland creation support to the woodland carbon code. There's a really significant piece of research being undertaken by Cambridge university at the moment to investigate technological solutions to challenges related to climate change, and that focuses on what a positive role woodland can play. Certainly, whilst I appreciate it can take a long time for trees to mature—and this is a conversation I've had with farmers, who sometimes are reluctant to plant more trees because they know that piece of land will be tied up for many, many years. You might be aware the National Farmers Union has actually said they'll be carbon-neutral by 2040, which is incredibly ambitious, so I think the agricultural sector is very very keen and take their role very seriously. Obviously, we can look at this as part of our post-Brexit sustainable land management policy.