The State of the World's Forests 2026 makes forest and landscape restoration its central theme and shows how far countries are from their targets.

BulletsIn

• FAO released the State of the World's Forests 2026 on September 28 in Rome, on the opening day of the 28th Committee on Forestry session.
• The biennial report is titled Restoring Forests and Landscapes: The Way Forward for a Sustainable Future.
• Forests cover 4.14 billion hectares, about 32% of the world's land, and store 714 gigatonnes of carbon.
• They are home to about 80% of terrestrial biodiversity.
• An estimated 489 million hectares of forest were lost to deforestation between 1990 and 2025.
• More than 1.56 billion hectares of land are degraded worldwide, including around 460 million hectares of forest land.
• About 470 million hectares must be restored by 2030 to meet Target 2 of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework.
• India reports 18.9 million hectares under restoration to the Convention on Biological Diversity, second only to China's 127.4 million hectares.
• The report urges four pathways covering people, land, finance, and policy and law.
• Restoration can return up to 30 dollars for every dollar invested under favourable conditions.

Tags: SOFO2026, ForestRestoration, FAO