Trees Quietly Return to Afghanistan's Farmland While Forests Keep

Trees Quietly Return to Afghanistan's Farmland While Forests Keep

While Afghanistan’s natural forests continue to shrink under decades of conflict, illegal logging and fuelwood extraction, an unexpected greening has been unfolding on the country’s farmland. A new study of four districts in Nangarhar Province in eastern Afghanistan has found that tree cover on agricultural land grew by roughly 36 percent between 2016 and 2024, expanding from 369.26 hectares to 502.58 hectares, a net gain of about 133 hectares. …