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The provisional results of analysis of high-tech aerial photography, satellite imagery and other sources were published today as part of a major Forestry Commission project to compile the next National Forest Inventory (NFI).

They show that England has 1,294,000 ha of woodlands covering 9.9 per cent of the land area, up 164,000 ha from the previous estimate from 2010.

The difference in reported areas is mostly due to improved technology and including small woods in towns and cities in the statistics for the first time.

Pam Warhurst, Chair of the Forestry Commission, welcomed the statistics’ publication, saying,

“If we are to have an ambitious programme of increased tree cover, which we must, we really do need to have a baseline that is robust and credible. What we have published today is just that.

“I’m particularly pleased that this work provides a great platform from which to plan urban tree expansion. Increasingly, planners, developers and investors are realising the benefits that trees bring, from their urban cooling effect through to just making our towns and cities more pleasant places to live in.”

The increase in the reported woodland area over the previous estimate can be attributed to a number of factors, as Peter Weston, Head of Inventory and Forecasting for the Forestry Commission, explained:

“The difference is mostly because we were able to use more sophisticated tools and techniques for gathering and interpreting woodland cover information than we have ever had since we began compiling forest inventories in the 1920s. These include satellite imagery and advanced geographical information systems (GIS).

“As a result we’ve been able to pick up more areas where woodland has regenerated or been planted, or been lost or removed, without our knowledge.

“We’ve also been able to ‘fine tune’ some of the data and correct mistakes in the previous inventory that inevitably happened because we did not have the sophisticated resources that we have now.

“This time we’ve also been able to accurately measure all woodland, urban and rural, down to areas as small as 0.5ha. Previously we only recorded the total area of woods greater than 2ha, and estimated the area of rural woods smaller than 2ha by recording a small sample and rating up the results.”
 

This and other information being compiled for the National Forest Inventory will help those planning to ensure that Britain's forests can withstand expected changes in the climate, contribute to climate change mitigation, and help society cope with some of the effects of climate change, such as flooding and heat-waves. NFI information will also underpin a wide range of future decisions about topics such as nature conservation, research, tree planting, forest and timber industries' development, and public recreation.

It will be valuable to people and organisations including: forestry policy makers; forest owners, managers and planners; the forestry and timber industries; local authorities; woodland-owning non-government organisations; and people and organisations with interests in biodiversity, wildlife, forest recreation, forest-related community development, and soil and water. The provisional woodland area results might also be a useful update for the Independent Forestry Panel for England, giving it robust and credible data to inform its work.