Forest Restoration Strategies and Biodiversity Conservation in China

China’s efforts to restore forest cover have become a global exemplar in scale and ambition, driven by pressing needs to counteract historic deforestation, soil erosion and biodiversity loss. Central to the national agenda has been the evolution from simple tree planting toward more ecologically sophisticated strategies. Early large-scale afforestation programmes prioritised fast-growing monocultures, yielding rapid gains in canopy cover but limited recovery of native species and ecosystem functions. More recent approaches emphasise mixed-species plantings, natural regeneration and landscape-scale planning, recognising that heterogeneous stands better support fauna, soil health and climate adaptation. Policy innovations—such as compensation schemes for ecological protection and incentives for restoring native forests on collective forest land—are reshaping the governance of forest restoration. Emerging tools in remote sensing and habitat modelling enable dynamic monitoring of forest trajectories, while revised definitions of what constitutes a “forest” support more nuanced assessments of restoration success. These developments interlink practical reforestation, biodiversity goals and rural livelihoods, fostering multifunctional landscapes that advance carbon sequestration, water regulation and species conservation at regional and national scales.

Research from Nature Portfolio

Recent studies have provided the first nationwide evaluation of China’s flagship reforestation scheme, revealing that most restored areas remain dominated by monocultures or simple mixtures. Analyses of bird and pollinator communities show that mixed-species plantings yield moderate gains in avian diversity but fail to restore insect assemblages to levels found in native forests. The work demonstrates that shifting investment toward diverse native species mixtures can enhance biodiversity without incurring significant economic costs for rural households. These insights underline the importance of species composition in large-scale afforestation and call for adaptive management to align restoration outcomes with conservation objectives.

Forest Restoration Strategies and Biodiversity Conservation in China publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in forest restoration strategies and biodiversity conservation in china across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Afforestation: Establishment of forest cover on land not recently forested.

Monoculture: Planting or growth of a single tree species over a large area.

Mixed forest: Stands comprising two or more tree species to enhance ecological complexity.

Native forest: Forest ecosystems composed of indigenous species with minimal human alteration.

Grain-for-Green Program (GFGP): China’s nationwide initiative converting cropland to forest or grassland to curb soil erosion.

Collective forest land (CFL): Forest areas owned and managed by rural communities or households rather than the state.

References

1. Opportunities for biodiversity gains under the world’s largest reforestation programme. Nature Communications (2016).
2. When is a forest a forest? Forest concepts and definitions in the era of forest and landscape restoration. Ambio (2016).
3. A New Opportunity to Recover Native Forests in China. Conservation Letters (2017).
4. Patterns and determinants of plant biodiversity in non-commercial forests of eastern China. PLOS ONE (2017).