Catherine Conlon: Returning to our roots: the case for restoring natural habitats and native woodland

Government policy makers who consistently proclaim their concern for the preservation of natural ecosystems need to move away from policies that are actively destroying it, writes Catherine Conlon

'Nature must be allowed to come back. Society needs it; our rapidly disappearing wildlife desperately needs it.'

In 2019, Ireland became the second country in the world to declare a climate and biodiversity emergency, with the European Parliament following suit six months later.

Last month Cop 15 — the 15th global biodiversity summit took place in Montreal to attempt to build a "Paris agreement for nature". The objective was to set the course of biodiversity action for the coming decades — to identify a series of targets on restoring nature, degraded landscapes, and species loss.