Position for forestry from the Spending Review 2007
The Spending Review was announced on 14 November 2007. This sets out the Scottish Government’s plans for the next 3 years, 2008-09 through to 2010-11. An indicative allocation of the Forestry Commission Scotland funding is shown below: Spending Review| | 2008-09 | 2009-10 | 2010-11 |
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| Forestry Department | 3.4 | 3.5 | 3.7 | | Grants (net of EC funding) | 21.0 | 21.0 | 21.0 | | Forestry Development Programme | 3.4 | 3.6 | 3.8 | | Timber Transport Fund | 5.0 | 5.0 | 5.0 | | Administration and non-cash | 34.5 | 37.6 | 39.9 | | Forest Enterprise | 23.0 | 23.0 | 23.0 | | Totals | 90.3 | 93.7 | 96.4 | GrantsThe table above only shows the previous baseline figure for grants (£28M less £7M co-financing). Full funding for the Scottish Rural Development Programme, which covers the 7 year period 2007 to 2013, has already been published, showing potentially record amounts being available for grants to the forestry sector through Rural Development Contracts. There will also be separate, smaller challenge schemes specifically to cover Forestry for People and Woods In and Around Towns (WIAT). In addition, the Government plans to support communities by continuing the Strategic Timber Transport Fund with £5 million per annum. This is particularly good news because we know there are some excellent projects being brought forward over the next three year period, which deliver significant benefits to rural communities. PartnershipsThe Forestry Development Programme, which funds partnerships with the private sector, other public sector bodies and NGO’s, will receive a modest increase to enable continued support of key projects helping to deliver maximum economic, environmental and social benefits from forestry. Managing the National Forest EstateWe continue to seek best value from our agency, Forest Enterprise Scotland, and will leave their funding at a flat level of £23 million over the three year period. However, the Scottish Government is enthusiastic about continuing to make the national forest estate fit to meet today’s priorities and has asked us to invest around £15 million a year to increase the level of new planting to contribute to climate change mitigation, but also to meet the other social, environmental and economic benefits which targeted forestry planting can bring. More details of this and a general statement of how we see the position of the National Forest Estate are shown in the attached annex to the spending review 07 (PDF 22k). Corporate PlanThe Forestry Commission Scotland Corporate Plan sets out our priorities for 2008 - 2011.
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