108. Our forest is bigger than your forest.
Who’s first for forests? Well, it looks like the Russian Federation tops the table with 809 million hectares, closely followed by Brazil and Canada. Australia meanwhile has the sixth largest area of forest coverage with 164 million hectares. Way to go mate!
In 2005, forests covered 30% of the world’s total land area - that’s an estimated 4 billion hectares of tree-filled natural beauty. Or, looking at it another way, that works out at around 0.62 hectares of forest for every person on earth.
The good news is that the rate the world’s forests are decreasing is actually slowing down, thanks to new forest planting, adding to depleted forests and the natural growth of established forests. But there’s still a long way to go…
