Trees outside forests

Rural people around the world are of one mind when it comes to the durability, availability and use of the goods and services provided by tree resources, whether inside or outside the forest. These men and women make no distinction between field trees and forest resources, perceiving the clear and close link between the two, and their interaction. Policy-makers and planners, however, tend to view these resources as different entities. It seems clear that Trees outside forests have not yet succeeded in arousing real interest at the top. So there is a need to describe and comprehend the dynamics of trees and shrubs on rural and urban land, and their interaction with forest dynamics. This should lead to a better understanding of off-forest tree management and towards integrated and sustainable management of natural resources and of forest, farm, pastoral and urban land.

Oak tree (Quercus sessiliflora) in the fields
near the forests of Tronçais, France
(Photo: Bellefontaine/Cirad) 		Woodlot within a barley field
(Photo: FAO) 

There is no direct definition of Trees Outside Forests (a neologism coined in 1995). The concept is defined by FAO by default in terms of the forest, as follows: trees growing outside the forest and not belonging to the category of forests, forest lands, or other wooded land.

To learn more about FAO's definition of Forestry please clic on the following links :
 Forest Resource Assessment 2000
Kotka IV Expert consultation
 Forestry Terminology

According to this definition, Trees outside forests are located on other land, including agricultural land (e.g. agroforestry systems, hedgerows, woodlots), built-up areas such as settlements and infrastructure (e.g. street trees, parks and other urban tree systems), and bare land such as dunes, former mining areas.

To learn more about the Trees outside forests' definition please clic on the following link :
 Conservation guide 35, Trees outside forests : toward better awareness

Ambiguities can easily arise, because the boundary between what is and is not forest can be quite blurred, and also because there is more than one definition of the word Forest.

In their search in selecting the best option to reach the three pilars of sustainability (environmentally sustainable, economically viable, and socially acceptable), the actors at all level of the decision making process are negociating around several questions. For instance:

Toward integrated management :
Local rationale or the technical option, can they be compatible?
Peasant practices and economic constraints: disfunction or balance?
Town and country: clash or fusion of ecological imperatives?
Trees outside forests and production systems:
Agroforests: forest-oriented agricultural strategy?
Coffee plantations: reconciling ecological and economic imperatives?
Linear tree systems: strategic components of integrated land management?

The importance of considering trees outside forests in the framework of the Global Forest Resources Assessment has first been recognized at the FAO/ECE Meeting of Experts on Global Forest Resources Assessment, held in Kotka, Finland in 1993. Since then, FAO has been raising the visibility to trees outside forests at policy and decision making level in order to increase the place of trees in land use and economy through harmonization of approaches and interests among institutions and sectors.