Tree planting is not a simple solution

• Published in: Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science) Vol. 368; no. 6491; pp. 580 - 581
• Main Authors: Holl, Karen D, Brancalion, Pedro H S
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States The American Association for the Advancement of Science 08.05.2020
• Subjects: Climate change; Deforestation; Environmental changes; Environmental impact; Greenhouse effect; Greenhouse gases; Mass extinctions; Nonprofit organizations; Planting; Tree planting; Trees; Water shortages
• ISSN: 0036-8075; 1095-9203
• DOI: 10.1126/science.aba8232

Tree planting must be carefully planned and implemented to achieve desired outcomes A plethora of articles suggest that tree planting can overcome a host of environmental problems, including climate change, water shortages, and the sixth mass extinction ( 1 – 3 ). Business leaders and politicians have jumped on the tree-planting bandwagon, and numerous nonprofit organizations and governments worldwide have started initiatives to plant billions or even trillions of trees for a host of social, ecological, and aesthetic reasons. Well-planned tree-planting projects are an important component of global efforts to improve ecological and human well-being. But tree planting becomes problematic when it is promoted as a simple, silver bullet solution and overshadows other actions that have greater potential for addressing the drivers of specific environmental problems, such as taking bold and rapid steps to reduce deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions.