Offaly Minister promotes wood-first construction approach

An Offaly Minister is calling for a wood-first approach to construction in Ireland to be considered.

Pippa Hackett, the Minister of State with responsibility for Forestry, was speaking at an event organised by Urban Lands Institute Ireland this week.

“I favour central government and local authorities exploring the concept of a wood-first policy. I have engaged directly with Minister Darragh O’Brien on this, and I believe that there is momentum building within Government to finally unlock the potential for mass timber construction in Ireland," she said.

The Green Party has called in the Seanad in recent months for an interdepartmental working group to look at the barriers to increasing timber use in construction, and to make recommendations for how those will be overcome.

“I am pleased to report that an interdepartmental group has been meeting in recent weeks, with officials from my own Department in Agriculture, the Department of Housing and the Department of Enterprise, as well as representatives from Coillte and the University of Galway.”

“This group will meet again with industry representatives, and I will be engaging with Minister O’Brien over the coming weeks with a view to formalising this working group.”

“Increased collaboration between Departments, agencies and stakeholders to shape our policies and increase the amount of timber used in construction will be crucial, and as I have said, I will continue to pursue this with my Government colleagues.”