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Crowther said his work predicted just two to three trees per field for most pasture: “Restoring trees at density is not mutually exclusive with grazing. “Without freeing up the billions of hectares we use to produce meat and milk, this ambition is not realisable,” he said. “It presents an ambitious but essential vision for climate and biodiversity.” But he said many of the reforestation areas identified are currently grazed by livestock including, for example, large parts of Ireland. “This research is excellent,” said Joseph Poore, an environmental researcher at the Queen’s College, University of Oxford. Of the 3.2bn ha of treeless land, 1.5bn ha is used for growing food, leaving 1.7bn of potential forest land in areas that were previously degraded or sparsely vegetated. This showed that about two-thirds of all land – 8.7bn ha – could support forest, and that 5.5bn ha already has trees. Artificial intelligence computing then combined this data with 10 key soil, topography and climate factors to create a global map of where trees could grow. The research is based on the measurement of the tree cover by hundreds of people in 80,000 high-resolution satellite images from Google Earth. “Personally, Brazil would be my dream hotspot to get it right – that would be spectacular.” “This is a new opportunity for those countries to get it right,” said Crowther. But the study shows that many of these countries have committed to restore less than half the area that could support new forests. Tree planting initiatives already exist, including the Bonn Challenge, backed by 48 nations, aimed at restoring 350m hectares of forest by 2030. In terms of carbon capture, you get by far your biggest bang for your buck in the tropics but every one of us can get involved.” The world’s six biggest nations, Russia, Canada, China, the US, Brazil and Australia, contain half the potential restoration sites. But it is by far the cheapest solution that has ever been proposed.” He said financial incentives to land owners for tree planting are the only way he sees it happening, but he thinks $300bn would be within reach of a coalition of billionaire philanthropists and the public.Įffective tree-planting could take place across the world, Crowther said: “The potential is literally everywhere – the entire globe. That means we could restore the 1tn trees for $300bn, though obviously that means immense efficiency and effectiveness. The study, published in the journal Science, determines the potential for tree planting but does not address how a global tree planting programme would be paid for and delivered.Ĭrowther said: “The most effective projects are doing restoration for 30 US cents a tree.
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René Castro, assistant-director general at the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, said: “We now have definitive evidence of the potential land area for re-growing forests, where they could exist and how much carbon they could store.” This is hugely important blueprint for governments and private sector.”
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They can also boost people’s wellbeing as part of green spaces, with research showing a two-hour “dose” of nature a week significantly improving health.Ĭhristiana Figueres, former UN climate chief and founder of the Global Optimism group, said: “Finally we have an authoritative assessment of how much land we can and should cover with trees without impinging on food production or living areas. In urban areas, the shade from trees has been shown to both cool city streets and reduce levels of air pollution. Trees are also important in controlling regional rainfall, as they evaporate water from their leaves. Tropical rainforests are especially important, hosting 50% of known terrestrial species on only 6% of the world’s land. Earth is at the start of a sixth mass extinction event of species and the razing of forests and other ecosystems is the biggest contributor to the losses. rees draw carbon dioxide back out of the atmosphere as they grow, and planting trees will need to play an important part in ending the climate emergency.įorests are also a vital and rich habitat for wildlife. This destruction is a significant contributor to the carbon dioxide emissions that are driving the climate crisis. Today, 10bn more trees are cut down than are planted every year. But twice as many existed before the start of human civilisation. There are about 3tn trees on the planet and they play a significant role in producing the oxygen we all breathe.