GREEN COLLAR INDUSTRIES
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Land Management
- Organic Agriculture
- Habitat Conservation/Restoration
- Urban Forestry & Parks
- Reforestation & Afforestation
- Soil Stabilization
Reforestation & Afforestation
Reforestation is the restocking of existing, depleted forests and woodlands with native tree stock. The term "reforestation" can also refer to afforestation, the process of restoring and recreating areas of woodlands or forest that once existed but were deforested or otherwise removed or destroyed at some point in the past. The resulting forest can provide both ecosystem and resource benefits such as: pollution control, dust control and has the potential to become a major carbon sink.
A debatable issue in managed reforestation is however whether or not the succeeding forest will have the same biodiversity as the original forest. If the forest is replaced with only one species of tree and all other vegetation is prevented from growing back, a monoculture forest similar to agricultural crops would be the result. However, most reforestation involves the planting of different seedlings taken from the area. More frequently, multiple species are planted as well. Another important factor is the natural regeneration of a wide variety of plant and animal species that can result from reforestation. In some areas the suppression of forest fires for hundreds of years has resulted in large single-aged and single-specied forests. Logging of small clearcuts, and/ or prescribed burning, actually increases the biodiversity in these areas by creating a greater variety of trees and ages and species.
Reforestation need not be only used for recovery of accidentally destroyed forests. In some countries, such as Finland, the forests are managed by the wood products and pulp and paper industry. In such an arrangement, like other crops, trees are replanted wherever they are cut. In such circumstances, the cutting of trees can be carefully done to allow easier reforestation. In Canada, the wood product and pulp and paper industry systematically replaces many of the trees it cuts, employing large numbers of summer workers for treeplanting work.
Reforestation, if several native species are used, can provide other benefits in addition to financial returns, including restoration of the soil, rejuvenation of local flora and fauna, and the capturing and sequestering of 38 tons of carbon dioxide per hectare per year.
Afforestation is the process of establishing a forest on land that is not a forest, or has not been a forest for a long time, by planting trees or their seeds. The term may also be applied to the legal conversion of land into the status of royal forest.
The term reforestation generally refers to the reestablishment of a forest after its removal, or planting more trees following a timber harvest. Many countries have experienced centuries of deforestation, and some governments and non-governmental organizations directly engage in programs of afforestation to restore forests and assist in preservation of biodiversity.
The United States and some Northwest European nations have more forest cover than at the beginning of the 20th century. Unfortunately, significant deforestation in South and Central America and in South Asia still continues.
In many various zones arid, tropical, or sensitive areas, forests cannot re-establish themselves without assistance due to a variety of environmental factors. One of these factors is that, once forest cover is destroyed in arid zones, the land quickly dries out and becomes inhospitable to new tree growth. Other critical factors include overgrazing by livestock and over-harvesting of forest resources. Together these may lead to desertification and the loss of topsoil. Without adequate soil, forests cannot grow until the very long process of soil creation has been completed. In some tropical areas, the removal of forest cover may result in a duricrust or duripan that effectively seal off the soil to water penetration and root growth. In many areas, reforestation is impossible because the land is in use by people. In these areas, reforestation requires the planting of tree seedlings. In other areas, the mechanical breaking-up of duripans or duricrusts is necessary, careful and continued watering may be essential, and special protection (fencing), may be required.