Two groups unite to oppose proposal to plant thousands of trees saying it could threaten the country’s ‘dramatic open views and vistas’

Scotland’s mountaineers and gamekeepers have rarely seen eye to eye. But now they have put their differences behind them to oppose an apparently innocuous plan that both say threatens the country’s landscape: a proposal to plant thousands of new trees.

The Scottish Gamekeepers Association (SGA) and Mountaineering Scotland admit they are unlikely bedfellows, having historically disagreed over access to land for walkers and issues of wildlife preservation. But they are united in their concerns over proposals that are part of the government’s Draft Climate Change Plan, which they say could threaten the country’s “dramatic open views and vistas”.

The two groups have written to Scotland’s environment secretary to raise issues about plans to increase the country’s woodland cover from 17% to 25% by 2050. The Draft Climate Change Plan includes a commitment to plant 10,000 extra hectares of trees between now and 2020, extending to 15,000 hectares per year by 2024.



Neil Reid of Mountaineering Scotland acknowledges that the interests of hillwalkers and mountaineers had sometimes clashed with those of gamekeepers in the past, but said the two bodies had a shared interest in protecting the iconic Scottish landscape.

“What we are arguing for is for a coherent policy,” he said. “There may well be arguments between all the various interested organisations about what that policy will eventually look like, and I imagine ourselves and the SGA will disagree on some issues, but what we’re completely agreed on is that there is a need for an overarching policy to be developed”.

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In the letter addressed to the Scottish environment minister, Roseanna Cunningham, the two bodies said there has so far been a “failure to join up what is required from the land to meet forestry targets and what we might want to keep in terms of internationally rare and valuable landscapes and ecosystems”.



“While Scotland’s open landscapes and upland moors are classed as rare in global terms, there is currently no policy position safeguarding them,” the letter reads. “Some areas are designated as of special ecological or scenic interest but most are unprotected and disregarded.”

Scotland’s woodland cover is about half of the average of other EU countries and less than one quarter of the woodland area that once covered much of Scotland’s land. Among the benefits of ‘afforestation’ cited by Scotland’s forestry commission are its contribution to tackling greenhouse gas emissions, restoring lost habitats for wildlife and flood management.

Kenneth Stephen, from the SGA, cited a report they commissioned by ecologist Dr James Fenton titled “A Future for Moorland in Scotland”. “The report suggested that, because of a lack of policy vision, globally rare habitats in Scotland have been lost in a piecemeal manner over decades,” he said.



“What we are saying is that we don’t want an unthinking loss of something that is so rare. What we really need is that overarching policy vision that puts these treasured landscapes at its heart.”

The body has estimated that 20% of heather moorland disappeared between 1940 and 1970 and a further 500,000 hectares is under threat through the Scottish government’s forestry strategy.

A Scottish government spokesman said that the increased woodland creation targets announced as part of the Climate Change Plan would be taken forward in a sustainable way, that included working closely with a range of stakeholders. “This will include appropriate consideration of Scotland’s distinctive upland landscapes,” they said.