Natural Regeneration

Harnessing the power of nature is essential for achieving the Paris Agreement goal of limiting global warming to well below 2°C beyond pre-industrial levels. Nature-based solutions can provide 30% or more of the climate change mitigation needed by 2030, yet they receive only 2% of global climate funding. Current nationally determined contributions to the Paris Agreement do not reflect the full potential of nature.

The most cost-effective solution for removing carbon from the atmosphere is restoring forests, and the most cost-effective way of restoring forests is by removing barriers to the natural regeneration process and—where required—accelerating it, a strategy known as assisted natural regeneration.

Under suitable conditions, assisted natural regeneration can reduce the costs of implementing restoration by more than 70% compared to active restoration, which uses full tree planting. Natural regeneration requires little or no specialist training.

Active restoration strategies can be used in areas where:
> economic development using timber species and agroforestry strategies are required by local communities; or
> assisted natural regeneration is not ecologically or economically feasible – that is, areas where land degradation or the opportunity cost of land is high, and the land is far from forest remnants from which seeds would naturally disperse.