The Sunday Telegraph seems to have got wind of a massive sell-off of State-owned forests which may involve a third of Forestry Commission land in England over the next four years and as much as half of its land by 2020.
Both the National Trust and the RSPB are quoted on this subject, and we both sound fairly relaxed about the principle but concerned about the detail.
It is a bit difficult to see why the State is the best organisation to grow our trees when their are plenty of commercial organisations in this business - as opposed to the fact that nobody makes money out of managing National Nature Reserves! The Forestry Commission was set up after World War One to ensure that we would always have a home-grown supply of pit-props in future conflicts - things have moved on. We don't have State farms growing our food, or State fishing fleets catching our fish, so we may not need State forests growing our trees.
But the FC does so much more than 'just' grow timber. Many of the sites owned or managed by them, such as large parts of the New Forest, Forest of Dean, Sherwood Forest and the less well-known Breckland forests of the Norfolk/Suffolk border, are very valuable for their landscapes, recreational opportunities and their wildlife.
The FC is a major player in the conservation of woodland butterflies (wood whites, purple emperors etc), heathland reptiles (sand lizards, adders etc) and heathland and woodland birds (nightjars, wood larks and goshawks etc). Much of the FC estate is designated for its nature conservation interest and importance. The fate of those species and the iconic sites which they occupy will be a source of concern to us as these plans unroll.
The number of alarming tree diseases that now seem to be constraining forestry in the UK may also be a factor in determining the long-term commercial value of these forests too.
So the devil is in the detail, as always, as some FC land is of high commercial value, some of high nature conservation value, some of high value for both and some, probably, of low value for either. But land always has some value depending on its commercial potential, character and the constraints that apply to it. It may not only be foresters who cast an eye over our forests - housing and other commercial developers may see the land beneath the trees as being the value in any disposal plans.
And to end on a naked plug! Back in 1990 I co-authored with Roderick Leslie (a forester - but a birder too!) a book called Birds and Forestry. Now back in print, and as an ebook, it is of historic interest to anyone who is thinking of buying up our forests!
Slightly surprised that you should include the Breckland forests as being valuable for their landscapes Mark. Writing of Breckland in 1954, in his excellent book Bird Pageant, A W P Robertson says:
"... there are vast unsightly tracts of conifers with which the Forestry Commission has swamped a great part of the countryside, and romantically styled 'Thetford Chase'. These are, to put it bluntly, factories for low-grade timber ... for altering the whole character of a district they stand alone ..."
Happily, the FC has upped its conservation game a lot in recent years, but as far as the landscape and wildlife of the Brecks is concerned, I'm with AWPR.