The government is planning to sell off our national forests which are currently owned by Coillte. The plan would be

to sell harvesting rights on 500,000 acres out of 1.2 million that they manage. They claim it is worth €700 million

although in the Peter Bacon report on Forestry, he puts the true value at €360 million or the equivalent of 3 days of

government expenditure. Bacon said: "economic rationale for the proposed sale of harvesting rights no longer stands up and cannot be justified." and that he further concluded it would actually cost the state €1,300 million to sell the harvesting rights of Coillte due to various liabilities. The report says that the forests should be developed further as a public resource.