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Scotland's Native Trees and Shrubs
The problem of supply and demand
The demand for native species of local provenance in the UK is a relatively new, but growing, sector of the hardy nursery stock market. The British hardy nursery stock producing industry has generally been slow to respond to the demand. And for good reasons. Historically, the scale of the demand has been low and inconsistent. The demand is now increasing but there is another problem - some major growers of native species of known UK provenance have little confidence that if they produce stock speculatively they will be able to sell it. The reason for this is that cheaper imported stock of Continental or unknown provenance can readily be substituted without detection by unscrupulous traders or contractors because of:
- the lack of robust regulations throughout the landscape industry to verify authenticity of provenance. This matter is currently being addressed by The Horticultural Trades Association and The Forestry Commission
- a general lack of common agreement, commitment, understanding and appreciation of the need for known provenance stock
- inadequate resources and quality assurance systems within client organisations to detect non-compliance
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