Participants can draw down a maximum payment of €560 to attend Forestry Knowledge Transfer Group (KTG) meetings and events, as part of the fifth leg of the scheme, launched by Senator Pippa Hackett, Minister of State with responsibility for Biodiversity and Land Use on Wednesday, July 13th, 2023.
A total of 7 meetings and/or events will be organised per KTG, according to the DAFM, which will pay participants €80/meeting.
Participants must attend a minimum of four meetings/evenst to become eligible for reimbursement of any costs, as verified by attendance sheets, with payment rates as follows:
- 1 meeting – €0
- 2 meetings – €0;
- 3 meetings – €0;
- 4 meetings – €320;
- 5 meetings – €400;
- 6 meetings – €480;
- 7 meetings – €560.
The measure’s terms and conditions, as published by the DAFM, state that participants must attend meetings and/or events in person for the duration of the Forestry KTG and cannot appoint a nominee to attend in their place.
Meanwhile, a KTG organiser will receive €7,400 per KTG. The KTGs are led by a professional forester and encourage participants to engage with forestry groups and professionals.
Forestry KTG
They operate with a bottom-up approach with the members themselves deciding on what it is they wish to learn.
Participants get the opportunity to learn from the experts and from each other’s experiences within a discussion group setting. In addition, KTGs can be used as a vehicle to bring forest owners in contact with professional foresters (KTG facilitators and Teagasc advisors).
Each KTG can have a maximum of 20 participants and a minimum of 10, while the maximum number of KTGs in an application is five.
Participants, who have not taken part in a Forestry KTG in the previous three years, can be invited to participate in this KTG round. Participation in other agriculture KTGs does not impact on participant’s eligibility to take part in Forestry KTGs.
The aim of the Forestry KTG Scheme is to increase awareness of sustainable forest management amongst forest owners and includes topics covering continuous cover forestry, agroforestry and building forest resilience.
This scheme is subject to an ongoing Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) and Appropriate Assessment (AA) process, and therefore, the minister reserves the right to revise the terms and conditions in accordance with relevant findings.
Therefore, applicants may be required to ‘opt-in’ to any revised terms and conditions before a decision is made on their application.
Completed applications must be submitted to the DAFM by 4:00p.m on August 14th, 2023.
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