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PaulHoule

Japan is mostly cold to temperate

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_of_Japan

except for some small islands like

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minamitorishima

There's a lot of concern that tree-planting projects wind up like this

https://e360.yale.edu/features/phantom-forests-tree-planting...

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I mean, you have major tree planting happening every summer in Canada, and it's all around trying to mono-culture the entire country for the sake of timber companies. They immediately spray Glyphosate on areas burnt by forest fires, so that low value fire break species like Alder don't establish themselves in the area and then they can send in tree planters to plant higher value pine, which is a serotinous species, ie: promotes fire. Then they blame all the bush fires on Climate change.

Separate from the forestry philosophy in the headlines article, Japan also famously made a decision in the 1960s that resulted in monoculturing the country into seasonal allergies for the timber industry: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hay_fever_in_Japan

Forest planting for commercial forestry is not the same as forest planting for urban improvement. The goals and means are different.

Climate change and forestry practices can both take blame for the fire cycles. Commercial foresters have been following these practices for generations and it only started becoming a major issue as climate conditions changed... Practices must adapt, but nobody likes change.

Note people in Japan are doing some things that seem radical, for instance replacing urban trees that produce allergy inducing pollen.

The Yale article says forest scientists warn that "failed afforestation projects around the world threaten to undermine efforts to make [tree] planting a credible means of countering climate change by reducing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere or generating carbon credits for sale to companies to offset their emissions."

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