Following the cancellation of summer and autumn shows such as APF, Farm Business Innovation, The Royal Welsh Show and CEREALS due to Covid-19 this year, Tilhill, the UK’s leading forestry management company, quickly took to releasing a series of free public webinars all with a common theme.
The theme was: “Making Trees Work for You” in order to spread the word to farmers and landowners on the myriad of benefits that tree planting can bring.
Tilhill took a virtual tour round the UK, starting in Scotland, dropping in on England and finally settling in Wales, extolling the virtues of woodland creation and how it remains a steady and loyal partnership option when it comes to providing farmers and landowners with an extra income stream.
The webinars were presented to over 300 attendees with detailed case studies showing how unproductive land has been transformed into woodlands to enhance the natural landscape and to increase the natural capital through woodland creation grants and professional management.
The webinars covered topics such as:
- Why plant?
- Where to plant;
- What to plant;
- What grants are available?
- Woodland creation results and returns;
- Benefits of woodland management;
- Carbon – its role in woodland creation.
Tim Liddon, Tilhill’s forestry director and webinar chair, with over 40 years’ experience in the forestry industry, opened the webinars with a reminder of the importance of woodland creation:
The rural landscape is changing, Brexit, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), changes in the new planting support and now coronavirus, there is also a greater significant focus on carbon and climate mitigation for us to consider – which of these are threats and which of these are opportunities is difficult to fathom at times and one size certainly doesn’t fit all.
“Through everything, forestry and woodland remain a steady and loyal partnership when it comes to providing farmers and landowners with additional income streams.
“We hope the webinars give a good glimpse of what a woodland can provide and the funding available to help landowners create it, enabling more informed decisions going forward to help gain greater financial security for their families and future generations.”
The webinars help landowners understand the in-depth process Tilhill undertakes to design, plant and execute woodland creation leaving attendees with a deeper sense of the benefits that woodlands can provide together with the importance of planting more trees.
