Lost Forest Planting Phase 1 at Kinrara: EIR Review

Information requested

Original request 202300390478

Information the Scottish Forestry holds about Brewdog's Phase 1 planting of the Lost Forest which has resulted in the death of many of the trees planted https://parkswatchscotland.co.uk/2023/11/11/brewdogs-lost-forest-at-kinrara-a-long-way-from-net-zero/

1. Please provide me with all correspondence to and from BrewDog and their agents in relation to the above contract and the work that has taken place on the Lost Forest in 2023.
2. Please provide me with any information Scottish Forestry holds on how many of the trees planted this year have taken and how many died.
3. Please provide with information Scottish Forestry holds about how much of the money due to BrewDog this year for Phase 1 of the Lost Forest has been paid, whether any has been withhold or is being clawed back and the reasons for that.

Regarding question 1, you subsequently clarified that your request should be taken to refer to only correspondence relating to the work that has taken place on the Lost Forest in 2023 under the contract.

Response

I have now completed my review of our response to your request under the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs).

1) Please provide me with all correspondence to and from BrewDog and their agents in relation to the above contract and the work that has taken place on the Lost Forest in 2023.

In the email exchange about the seed source of the trees the one on 4th October [2023] refers to SF accepting the seeds used in zones 105 and 106 would be suitable on the basis of an email exchange "earlier in the year". That was not included in the response. It may of course be the case that the respondent got the year wrong and that correspondence was in 2022. If so, I hope you would still supply that but if not would like to make a new FOI for "all correspondence to and from BrewDog and their agents in relation to the Lost Forest contract and the work that has taken place in 2022.

On review I have confirmed that the email exchange to which you refer was included in our release under the file name “2023_02_07_Seed Zones email exchange_Redacted”. I have reattached a copy to this response.

2) Please provide me with any information Scottish Forestry holds on how many of the trees planted this year have taken and how many died.

While you have provided me with a summary of the information about the number of Scots Pine and mixed broadleaf that have died, which is very helpful, the source of that information is not provided. The staff concerned must have some evidence to back up those figures and I believe that would come within the terms of my request. I am also unclear as to why staff would have estimated survival rates among mixed broadleaf and Scots Pine but not birch which comprise almost half the site and believe that information about that falls within the terms of my FOI. However, if not, I would like to make a new request for all information Scottish Forestry holds about the areas planted with birch and the reasons why staff did not come up with an estimate of the survival rate of trees planted in those areas.

In our previous release we provided the summary inspection report following our inspection of Lost forest. Four staff members were involved in the inspection and they split the site into 2 parts with 2 staff walking round each section. They then collated the findings into the summary report supplied.

The attached file titled “21fgs62745 lost forest site inspection report 07-09-2023.pdf” is the output from one pair of assessors which shows the location of plots and notes taken at the time. There were technical difficulties with the tablet they were using, hence notes were written into the map and data captured when they returned to the office. The field map was not retained after the information was captured.

The attached file titled “inspection report – 21fgs62745-No_Date.pdf” is the output we have from the other group. This contains the photographs which were downloaded, but unfortunately the notes were not downloaded and filed, and are not now available from the tablet due to a factory reset of the device to accommodate a move to corporate cloud storage. A further 12 photographs were taken during the inspection and these are attached for completeness.

This is all of the data that we have available from the inspection.

It might be useful to clarify the purpose of the admin inspection that was carried out. It is to ensure that the capital items claimed are in place and that the boundaries of the different options are as per the contract. A few plots were put in to establish the mounding and planting spacing to check compliance with the option requirements.

It may also be useful to note that the cost of purchasing replacement trees and for replanting to replace any losses will fall to the landowner and not the public purse. SF will expect full stocking at establishment (year 5) as per the grant contract and a further inspection will normally be undertaken at that point to confirm the grant conditions have been met and validate the grant payment.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.

EIR 202400401331 - Information released - Annex

File type

13 page PDF

File size

4.1 MB