FAO Forestry country profiles - natural woody vegetation

Forest cover map

The designations employed and the presentation of material in this publication do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries.

Map source: Global Forest Resources Assessment 2000, base map: ESRI

The above map is an extract from the Global Forest Cover map produced as part of FRA 2000. Please refer to FRA Working Paper 19 for a background to the production of the map.

Temperate, semi-humid; semi-arid and arid forests cover about 12 400 000 ha. Over 90 percent of them are hardwoods.

Certain types of trees predominate in various geographical regions due to differences in temperature, moisture supply, soil conditions and elevation. Some of the forests have been destroyed or severely degraded.

Five different regional forest types may be distinguished as follows:

The Caspian broadleaved deciduous temperate forests: These forests are also called the Hyrcanian forests. They are located on the south coast of the Caspian Sea and the northern slopes of the Alborz mountain range from sea level to 2 800 m altitude.

The Caspian forests area is about 1 900 000 ha. They extend for 800 km in length and about 25 km in width. Approximately 60 percent of these forests are used for commercial purposes and the rest of them are more or less degraded. The average annual precipitation ranges from 600 to 2 000 mm with a maximum in the west and a minimum in the east. These are the most valuable forests in Iran.

Arasbaran sub-higrophic forest: These forests, located in north-western Iran, look like the Hyrcanian forest but some of species such as Fagus orientalis and Quercus castaneifolia do not grow in the Arasbaran region.

Irano-Toranian evergreen and broadleaved forests: These cover an area of about 3 500 000 ha in the central plateau and mountainus part of the country. The region is arid to semi-arid and the annual precipitation varies between 100 and 400 mm.

Zagrosian broadleaved deciduous forests: The main constituent of these forests is oak, Quercus spp. They stretch from north to south along the Zagros mountains, extending as far as Shiraz. They grow under annual precipitation between 450 and 1 050 mm. They are subject to over-exploitation and degradation due to intensive human activities and overgrazing.

The Khalijo-Ommanian forests: This region comprises the entire southern part of Iran between the southern watersheds of the Zagros, the coast of the Persian Gulf and the sea of Oman. The climate is subtropical with hot summers. The average annual rainfall is less than 200 mm.