{"id":30241,"date":"2021-12-15T12:15:22","date_gmt":"2021-12-15T12:15:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/?p=30241"},"modified":"2022-01-07T09:26:23","modified_gmt":"2022-01-07T09:26:23","slug":"shard-based-speculators-destroying-farmland-in-tree-mania","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/shard-based-speculators-destroying-farmland-in-tree-mania\/","title":{"rendered":"Shard-based speculators destroying farmland in \u2018tree-mania\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Monoculture<\/a>
Monoculture conifers on a hillside in Wales shielded by a curtain of native trees<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

British farmland, our rural communities and even UK food security are at risk from \u2018tree- mania\u2019 led by venture capitalists egged on by government grants in a scramble to fulfil tree-planting promises made by multinationals to \u2018offset their carbon footprint\u2019.<\/p>\n

One of them is the Foresight Group, based in the Shard office block in London.\u00a0 Their subsidiary Foresight Sustainable Forestry Company Ltd<\/b><\/a> are buying prime agricultural land in Wales with Government grants and planting monoculture conifers on it.<\/p>\n

Their activities are not remotely \u2018sustainable\u2019 because (1) they damage the eco-system and rural life and (2) better trees than those they are planting are being cut down in a rainforest across the globe to plant and raise the food that the land they bought should have produced to feed our population.<\/p>\n

We prepared a leaflet to give out at the Shard on 16th December 2021. Here is the text of it:<\/p>\n

Shard-based speculators destroying farmland in \u2018tree-mania\u2019<\/h2>\n

\u2018I think that I shall never see,<\/strong>
\n\u2018A poem lovely as a tree\u2019\u00a0 <\/strong>Wrote the poet Alfred Joyce Kilmer.<\/p>\n

We all love trees, and planting them is seen as one way to absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Plants use the energy from sunlight during the day to transform atmospheric carbon dioxide into organic matter based on carbon. In the process they release oxygen into the air.<\/p>\n

Greenwashing<\/h2>\n

Multinational corporations are engaged in \u2018greenwashing\u2019 to offset their carbon footprint. And that normally means promising to plant trees. Woodside Trust say<\/b><\/a> Lloyds Bank, Sainsbury\u2019s, DFS and the People\u2019s Postcode Lottery have all promised to plant trees, and there are thousands of other corporations in the same climate-savvy boat.<\/p>\n

But where will they plant all these promised trees? And in the rush, will they plant the right tree, in the right place, for the right reason?<\/p>\n

If a tree stores 250kg of carbon over its life and each UK person emits 12 tons yearly, it would need the entire UK area to plant the required 3.2 billion trees for one year\u2019s emissions. It\u2019s absurd and ignores all the other carbon sinks such as grassland, peat moorland and above all, oceans.<\/p>\n

Worldwide, in July this year, Oxfam crunched the numbers<\/b><\/a> and found that if all the trees the global companies have promised were planted, they would occupy an area five times the size of India, or all the farmland on the planet.<\/p>\n

In short, there just isn\u2019t enough land to fulfil the tree-planting promises and even to attempt it is a threat to global food security.<\/p>\n

Enter the Foresight Group<\/h2>\n

Of course the companies making these unrealistic virtue-signalling promises are not planting trees themselves. They sub-contract the job out to a tree-planting firm. Venture capitalists are now jumping on the band-wagon.<\/p>\n

The latest is the Foresight Group and its subsidiary Foresight Sustainable (sic) Forestry Company Ltd. They are based in the Shard, the glass-clad office block at London Bridge.<\/p>\n

The directors are listed<\/b><\/a> as Richard Davidson, accountant Sarika Patel, consultant Josephine Bush and timber industry veteran Christopher Sutton.<\/p>\n

Monoculture<\/h2>\n

These speculators have spotted a way to make money out of Climate Change and Net Zero aspirations. They are buying up good grazing land in Wales. Then they apply for Welsh Government grants and pay another sub-contractor to dig it all up, releasing carbon stored in the ground, and plant trees on it.<\/p>\n

They plant a monoculture of quick-growing conifers, usually alien species like Sitka spruce, perhaps hidden behind a thin net curtain of native trees.<\/p>\n

The Woodland Trust say native trees such as oak, ash, beech, hazel, Scots pine, randomly planted or self-sown, are far better for bio-diversity than non-native conifers such as spruce. Monoculture conifers deprive many meadow flowering plants, butterflies and ground-nesting birds such as curlews of their habitat. They also decrease public access and involvement in nature.<\/p>\n

Planted on hillsides<\/h2>\n

Non-native tree-planting has been done in the past in Wales. Vast areas of moorland and scrub hillsides were acquired by the Forestry Commission and planted with conifers as far back as the 1920s. The Brechfa Forest in Carmarthenshire is just one example. The object then was to increase the production of domestic timber for construction.<\/p>\n

As Sitka spruce takes between 25-35 years to be ready for harvesting, many of these non- native forests have already been harvested or are being harvested right now. In some cases, the foresters are having the courtesy to replant the hillsides with native trees like Welsh sessile oak.<\/p>\n

Prime Agricultural Land<\/h2>\n

But the Foresight Group are buying, not hillsides, not scrub, but prime agricultural land. The United Kingdom currently imports 45% of its food. If young farmers in Wales are denied the opportunity to raise livestock on good Welsh land, not only does that impact rural life, but it means the livestock we need will be raised elsewhere.<\/p>\n

That will probably mean cutting down trees in Brazil and converting land that was rainforest into grazing. It won’t be very good grazing land and won\u2019t last very long before it is exhausted. So collectively we have cut down a better tree on poorer land in Brazil and grown a worse tree on prime land in Wales.<\/p>\n

Not sustainable<\/h2>\n

All ways around that has damaged bio-diversity, released more carbon than it has gained, harmed UK food security, increased food miles and desecrated good land, all for a quick profit. It is not remotely sustainable.<\/p>\n

Foresight are not saving the planet. They are making money. Even giving them the benefit of the doubt, it is hard to think of any get-rich-quick scheme which is quite as irresponsible, grasping and destructive as that being pursued by the Foresight Group and Foresight \u2018Sustainable\u2019 Forestry in the Shard.<\/p>\n

Care for Creation<\/h2>\n

People of all faiths and indeed of none are concerned about the environment and human society, but as we are a Christian group, we\u2019ll just take this opportunity to bring you up to speed with what we believe.<\/p>\n

We worship God as the Almighty Creator of heaven and earth. In his first commandment to Adam and Eve, he gave them, and us their successors, a duty to care for his creation and put it in order:<\/p>\n

Genesis 1:28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.<\/b> (KJV)<\/p>\n

Creation is here for us, not us for it. People have a God-given right to socialise, to earn a living, to house, clothe and feed themselves and their families.<\/p>\n

So the Almighty is concerned about the whole of life, about nations, families and even individuals. He gave us righteous laws to live by and to ensure a stable society. Men always think they know better than God, but trying to go another way brings instability and ultimate destruction.<\/p>\n

A bit of good news<\/h2>\n

At a personal level, sin separates us from God, but belief in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ forgives your sin and gives you the power of the Holy Spirit to live a new, better, forgiven life. The first public words of Jesus, recorded in Mark’s Gospel, were:<\/p>\n

Mark 1:15: \u2018The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent ye and believe the Gospel\u2019.<\/b><\/p>\n

The Gospel does not just mean forgiveness and salvation, it brings healing and deliverance. Whatever sin or spiritual power is holding you back, you will find release and freedom in Jesus to live life to the full. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ today, and know his purpose for your life.<\/p>\n

Prayer and Action!<\/h2>\n

Pray against this irresponsibility. Pray for wisdom from on high for those in authority. May Almighty God bring the destructive schemes of the mighty to naught.<\/p>\n

The same scandal appears to be taking place all over England and Wales, and probably in Scotland nand Northern Irealnd as well. Use this link to the UK Parliament website<\/b><\/a> to email your MP to ask the Government what assessment they have made of the impact on UK food security and biuodiversity and on worldwide deforestation of planting conifers on prime British farmland, and if they will end Government grants for this practice.<\/p>\n

We appreciate your support – without it we can’t do our research and help inform your prayers.
\nSo click below to join Christian Voice and stand up for the King of kings<\/b>
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British farmland, our rural communities and even UK food security are at risk from \u2018tree- mania\u2019 led by venture capitalists egged on by government grants in a scramble to fulfil tree-planting promises made by multinationals to \u2018offset their carbon footprint\u2019. One of them is the Foresight Group, based in the Shard office block in London.\u00a0 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":30242,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30241","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t