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The Woodland
League is a not-for-profit independent community-based
organisation, non-denominational, non-political advocates of
Agenda 21 and an all-Ireland body. Our aim is to restore
the relationship between people and their woodlands.
The Brian Boru Oak Tree,
Tuamgraney
We came together
through the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification
initiative whereby Coillte were seeking an eco-label
verification to satisfy the Irish states commitments to
Sustainable Forest Management under the Helsinki and Lisbon
agreements. FSC is an Agenda 21-based process and with this
understanding, we engaged in this consultation process,
along with many other communities and NGOs.
The Convention
on Biological Diversity 1993, which the state also signed up
to, whose definition of sustainability emphasises the
protection of native flora and fauna in situ / place of
origin particularly the native trees of any place (being
natures highest achievement in the plant kingdom), states
that native forests must be granted highest priority for
protection, conservation and enhancement. All stability in
nature of soil, air and water is conferred by native trees.
Our experience
in this FSC process was frustrating, leading us to create
the Woodland League as a means of better serving the
numerous communities and NGOs that we were liaising with and
who were also experiencing difficulties with the process.
We realised that
there was a need for an umbrella / focus organisation to
highlight and communicate the new awareness of the benefits
of continuous-cover, multi-use native woodlands with a
view to creating new community native tree nurseries and
woodlands.
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