![]() ![]() Coordinate different land uses across the landscape. So it’s not just about planting trees but about choosing a strategy that restores the whole forest ecosystem which is key to providing the full suite of ecosystem services that people expect from tree planting, such as pollination, erosion control, and water purification.ĥ. These other species play important roles, such as dispersing seeds and pollinating plants. Forests include many types of plants besides trees, such as herbs and vines, as well birds, mammals, insects, fungi, and so much more. Different remote sensing approaches (airplane and drone Lidar scanning, orbital sensors, and machine learning) to monitor forest restoration. If it is necessary to plant trees, what species are most likely to grow well at a given site and achieve project goals? Who will take care of the trees? How will we evaluate whether the project has been successful or whether corrective actions need to be taken? Since forests take a long time to recover, the new forest will also need to be monitored and managed for at least a few decades. For example, is it necessary to plant trees or will the forest recover on its own (which does happen in some cases)?. Given the many different motivations for tree planting it is important to agree upon goals at the outset and then think through a number of questions about how best to achieve those goals over time. Tailor tree planting strategies to clearly stated project goals and plan, adaptively manage, and evaluate success over a sufficiently long timeframe. Aligning decisions amongst a farmer, an international NGO and a restoration company about where to plant native trees on a cattle ranching farm in the Amazon. These different motivations for tree planting need to be coordinated and balanced as there are trade-offs. ![]() The farmers, in turn, want to plant trees in areas that are not good for crops and plant species that provide benefits, such as fruit crops and erosion control. The conservation organisation aims to provide habitat for endangered species but it does not own the land, therefore it uses the money to plant trees on farmers’ land. These groups are motivated to plant trees for different reasons which often are not aligned and may even be in conflict.įor instance, to offset its greenhouse gas emissions, a global corporation provides funding for a conservation organisation to plant trees. The innumerable tree planting initiatives range from those committed to planting a few trees in a school backyard to a trillion trees across the planet. ![]() This means providing alternative sources of income for people who protect forest on their land, strengthening legal enforcement, and promoting supply chain interventions to curb deforestation.Ģ. So the most important and effective way to increase forest cover is to prevent clearing in the first place. It is extremely challenging to recreate a complex forest ecosystem and it takes decades to centuries for forests to recover. At the same time as the number and scale of tree planting initiatives is exploding, large swaths of existing forest are being cut down, including old-growth forests that could never be replaced by tree plantations. Address the underlying drivers of forest degradation. A forest restoration project in Brazil’s Atlantic Forest at the time of tree planting (left) and after two years.ġ. In our latest paper in the Journal of Applied Ecology, we provide guidelines on how to direct the enthusiasm for large-scale tree planting in a way that maximizes the benefits. But tree planting can have unintended consequences and requires extensive planning and an ongoing commitment to achieve the desired outcomes. Tree planting has been promoted globally as the silver bullet to solve multiple environmental and social problems, and, indeed, well-planned tree planting along with other strategies to protect and increase forest cover can provide many benefits to people and the millions of other species that depend on forests. So it’s not surprising that governments, businesses, conservation organisations and people everywhere are talking about planting trees – lots and lots of trees. You dig a hole, put a tree seedling in the ground, fill the hole with soil, and voila, you have done something good for the planet and future generations. Here they share their findings, including guidelines to increase success of these ambitious efforts world-wide. With a growing number of tree planting initiatives at regional to global scales, Karen Holl and Pedro Brancalion highlight in their latest research how planting trees is much more complicated than it seems. ![]()
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