Clarke Cunningham has planted 33,000 trees in 14 years

The acorns of a sustainable hardwood industry in Northern Ireland are being planted with the resurgence of broadleaf trees.

Oak, ash, beech and rowan are some of the species being introduced by many landowners and farmers who have converted to forestry.

Northern Ireland's total area of woodland is just 6% of the land area - the lowest in Europe.

Of that 6%, 4% is state-owned and 2% is in private hands.

NI FORESTRY Between 1998 and 2002, 7,500 acres of NI land were planted with trees under the Woodland Grant Scheme Two-thirds of this area was planted with broadleaf trees Moves are being made to plant smaller woodlands in the lowlands The forestry trend is away from conifers Just 6% of NI land is covered by forest More native species are being planted than ever before New woodlands of at least 0.5 acre are eligible for aid under the Woodland Grant Scheme

However, that is a trend the Forest Service is keen to reverse.

It is providing grants to landowners to plant trees, part-funded by the European Union under the Rural Development Regulation Plan and the Building Sustainable Prosperity Programme.

The process of transforming intensively managed farmland into woodland increases biodiversity and provides a habitat for many forms of wildlife.

But the establishment of a sustainable hardwood industry is not achievable in the short-term.

Lough Neagh

Clarke Cunningham, who runs a tree maintenance and woodland management business near Killyleagh in County Down, says getting to that point could take between 90 and 200 years.

"It is a plan for the future. There are so many countries ahead of us - France and Germany are exporting hardwood as hard as they can go because they have more than they need - it is going to be very hard to compete," he says.

"What I have done is cover the small niche market of producing timber that the French don't produce, like elm and character grade oak."

This tree was planted in Shane's Castle in the 1750s

In the past 14 years, he has planted about 33,000 trees.

Clarke has oaks lying in his timber yard which were planted at Shane's Castle on the shores of Lough Neagh in the 1750s.

Now they have reached the end of their natural lives, they will be processed and made into quality flooring or furniture.

Responsible for planting and maintaining Belfast's public trees, the tree surgeon began business in 1984 and now employs up to 40 people in the picturesque townland of Ballytrim.

'Playing catch-up'

An increase in rural employment is a by-product the Forest Service is keen to see from a growing forestry industry.

Clarke is now the largest employer in the area and hails the quality of local timber.

"Hardwoods are being planted much more, the Forest Service is driving it on and there are very good grants for it.

Each tree has a distinctive character and the person who is purchasing is looking at individual trees rather than looking at thousands of tonnes of conifers Stuart Morwood Forest Service

"The planting is the easy bit - it is the next 150 years we have to worry about."

He says continental Europe has forestry down to a fine art and that Northern Ireland is playing "catch-up".

That is a view shared by Stuart Morwood of the Forest Service, an agency of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development.

He says there is "a tremendous amount of catching up to do" in the amount of land planted with trees in Northern Ireland.

"But catch-up isn't just a case of establishing more woodland per se," he says.

"It is actually developing the skills of how these woodlands are going to be managed.

"There is absolutely no point in putting a tremendous amount of effort into woodland creation, if at the same time people's skills and knowledge of the woodland isn't developing."

Better soil nutrients

While conifers are regarded as a "commodity product" sold by the 1,000 tonnes, broadleafs are sold by the tree, says Mr Morwood.

"Each tree has a distinctive character and the person who is purchasing is looking at individual trees rather than looking at thousands of tonnes of conifers.

Stuart Morwood says Forest Service encourages lowland planting

"In terms of end use, it will tend to be for slightly more specialised niche markets."

The industry employs more than 1,000 people and contributes up to �40m a year to the Northern Ireland economy.

The Forest Service is encouraging landowners to plant trees in lowland areas, where better soil nutrients allow for a wider variety of species.

Over the past five years, 1,000 acres of broadleaf woodland has been established every year in Northern Ireland.

While some species do not need a relatively long rotation period, some trees such as oak need much longer to mature and this inevitably means the roots of a sustainable industry are at an early stage.

"If Clarke is getting an oak from Shane's Castle, which say for argument's sake is 100-years-old, the broadleaves which have been planted over the last 15 years have then got 85 years to develop - so it is a long haul," says Mr Morwood.