Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 3:56 pm on 1 July 2020.
Whilst we acknowledge and welcome all the green projects you've outlined in your report, Minister, I have to return to the subject that R.T. Davies mentioned earlier on, and that's the business of tree planting. I'm not going to go into the details of it; I've got the details in front of me now. You have given a fairly comprehensive answer to R.T.'s question, but I have to say that we can't have any meaningful discussion on the mitigation of climate change without addressing our record on tree planting in Wales. And we have to look at the other aspects of tree planting—their effect on stemming floods, which are having a devastating effect on many communities in Wales, often outlined in contributions to Plenary debates, and, again, said to be another manifestation of global warming, although there's no scientific evidence that this is a man-made phenomenon.
But we have to say that the Minister for economy and infrastructure and skills has emphasised that recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic in Wales is to be a green-led economy. Now, surely, trees, and all the environmentally friendly products that can be produced from the timber they yield, must play an important part in that new, green economy. Woodlands provide many of the things we need and use—construction materials, paper pulp and woodchip, packaging and pallets, as well as wood fuel for power plants. Timber and wood products also offer a cost-effective and valuable alternative to fossil-fuel-rich materials, such as steel and concrete. And there are, of course, all the by-products of the forest: non-timber products, such as game, honey, berries, fungi—the list is quite endless. It could be said the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 demands that you produce the forests that you have already said that you would produce.