More than two billion hectares of the world’s deforested and degraded landscapes are likely to offer potential for restoration — a vast opportunity to reduce poverty, improve food security, reduce climate change, and conserve biodiversity.

Over the last several centuries, vast forest areas have been cleared as agriculture has spread and human populations
have grown. About 30 percent of global forest cover has been completely cleared and a further 20 percent has been
degraded. Breaking the spiral of loss and degradation and restoring these lands would bring many benefits.
Restored lands support livelihoods and biodiversity by supplying clean water, reducing erosion, providing wildlife habitat, biofuel, and other forest products. Forests and trees mitigate climate change by sequestering carbon. Trees in agricultural landscapes can enhance soil fertility, conserve soil moisture, and boost food production.

One and a half billion hectares would be best-suited for mosaic restoration, in which forests and trees are combined
with other land uses, including agroforestry, smallholder agriculture, and settlements.
l Up to about half a billion hectares would be suitable for wide-scale restoration of closed forests.
l In addition to these two billion hectares, there are 200 million hectares of unpopulated lands, mainly in the far northern boreal forests, that have been degraded by fire.

These areas would likely be difficult to restore due to their remoteness.

Forest and landscape restoration is about more than just trees. It goes beyond afforestation, reforestation, and ecological
restoration to improve both human livelihoods and ecological integrity.

Key characteristics include the following:
l Local stakeholders are actively engaged in decision making, collaboration, and implementation.
l Whole landscapes are restored, not just individual sites, so that trade-offs among conflicting interests can be
made and minimized within a wider context.
l Landscapes are restored and managed to provide for an agreed, balanced combination of ecosystem services and
goods, not only for increased forest cover.
l A wide range of restoration strategies are considered, from managed natural regeneration to tree planting.
l Continuous monitoring, learning, and adaptation are central.
A restored landscape can accommodate a mosaic of land uses such as agriculture, protected reserves, ecological corridors, regenerating forests, well-managed plantations, agroforestry systems, and riparian plantings to protect waterways.
Restoration must complement and enhance food production and not cause natural forests to be converted into plantations.