Forest Campaigns Network – Press release 04/03/11
New alliance of forest campaign groups calls for a proper say on the future of our public woods.
Forest Campaigns Network – Press release 04/03/11
Previous post: ‘Independent’ Panel members announced
Next post: Celebrate Our Forests Day!
The natural vegetation of Britain is mainly deciduous forest. This forest was mostly cut down in prehistoric times by the agricultural immigrants who supplanted the hunter gather people. I feel very strongly that as much of Britain as possible should be returned to its natural state. Obviously this is only possible over a relatively tiny area because of the enormous human population which has caused massive areas of countryside to be built over- I understand that we built over more land in the 20th. century than had ever been built over in previous history. Our population is still on the increase, and with the current alteration in planning law, the loss of open land will increase dramatically.
There is an urgent need to replant as much forest as quickly as possible, before massive building programmes are initiated.
I would suggest that some of the new afforestation, say 20%, be made inaccessible for human leisure purposes so that we can re-generate as many of our lost animal and plant species as possible, that have been driven to extinction by human activity in the past. To achieve this human disturbance would have to be kept to an absolute minimum.
Colin Wells
Great dream but only achievable with human extinction. What we need is woodland that works for us as well as all other purposes, including biodiversity. But our soils and climate are simply no longer fit to return woodland into an exact replica of our prehistoric woodland, not that we should either. We cannot carry on with the impossible believe that all woodland can be ‘multifunctional’ without compartmentation or categorisation and we cannot fail future generations in only having ‘look but don’t touch woodland’. If they, our children and our children’s children, are to forward the sustainable development that this generation has largely failed to understand let alone achieve they will need well planned woodland, woodland that is planted now! And that means we need plantations, we need to co exist with trees in a peri urban or urban environment that will also serve a purpose as timber.