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John O’Reilly has spent 30 years making a living out of forestry but doesn’t just see timber as a commodity. He has always been a big nature lover. “That would have been my primary driver on day one,” he says of his career choice. “I’d have been a mouth open, David Attenborough watcher on telly all the time, always was.”
Having spent most of his life working for leading player Green Belt Forestry, he has now taken an entrepreneurial turn, leading and investing in NewGen, a sustainable forestry manager. Earlier this month it revealed details of its Family Tree Impact Investments (FTI) platform, which will spend €50m over three years buying harvesting rights from landowners.