Assessing the Potential for Forest Landscape Restoration

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Activity Type: 
Activities Related to Cross-Sectoral Cooperation

Assessing the Potential for Forest Landscape Restoration to Contribute to Poverty Alleviation, Climate Change Mitigation & Sustainable Forest Management

CHALLENGE

Forests used to covered almost twice the area that they do today. And the loss is continuing at a rapid rate. The focus of the international forest and climate debate has been on avoiding further deforestation and degradation of forests in developing, often tropical, countries. Recently these discussions have begun to acknowledge the potential for forest restoration in mitigating the impacts of climate change.

Forests can recover. Restoration of degraded lands is receiving increasing attention because of growing demand for forest products and bioenergy, and for the potential to create socio-economic opportunities, increase carbon densities, contribute to food security, and adapt to climate change.
 
The amount of land in need of restoration appears to be huge.  Very little, however, is known, however, about the scope, extent, geographical variation, and priorities of the restoration potential.
 

APPROACH 

This activity, to be implemented by World Resources Institute and IUCN, on behalf of the Forest Landscape Restoration Global Partnership, aims to create awareness among decision-makers and the public about the potential for restoration of degraded lands through forest landscape restoration. It aims to underpin the design of policies and initiatives to capture the potential wide range of benefits from restoration.
 
The project will use existing knowledge and spatial imagery to:

  • Assess the scope and scale of the opportunity for restoration of degraded forest landscapes around the world.
  • Provide a basis for identifying restoration priorities.
  • Highlight existing examples from around the world.
  • Describe weaknesses and gaps in the assessment and underlying data.
  • Propose next steps.

A range of possible restoration purposes will be considered including restoration of ecosystem services, increasing carbon density, and creating of livelihood opportunities.

MAIN FINDINGS

This activity is ongoing. Results will be shared on this page when they become available. You can also follow us on twitter (www.twitter.com/forestideas) or subscribe to our mailing list for regular updates.

Last updated 06/16/2010