Forest ecosystems occupy a substantial part of the Earth’s land surface. Forests are crucial to global carbon sinks, capturing and storing terrestrial carbon and accounting for approximately 25% of the world’s atmospheric carbon. Forests are critical in offering many ecosystem services, notably carbon sequestration, habitat conservation, and promoting ecological sustainability. Nearly 45% of the organic carbon present in biomass and soil is stored in forests. Carbon storage in forests is critically important from ecological and environmental perspectives. Despite their importance, terrestrial forests face significant threats from human activities like agricultural development, land use and land cover change (LULC), over-exploitation, and infrastructure expansion development leading to changes in forests and carbon storage dynamics and contributing to approximately 25-30% of all greenhouse gas emissions. These activities have adversely affected the forests' carbon storage capacity and ecological functionality. Hence, this research topic is timely and can address several emerging gaps and priorities crucial for climate change mitigation, biodiversity conservation, sustainable land use, and enhancing human well-being.

Forest landscape restoration and carbon storage dynamics are connected to many climate change mitigation strategies and ecosystem restoration programs. Increasing forest carbon sequestration requires diverse sustainable forest management practices (e.g., enrichment planting, regeneration, silviculture management, agroforestry systems, afforestation, reforestation, and selective logging assessments). Forests sequester carbon through their foliage and store it in tree trunks, branches, and roots, as well as within soil pools and forest litter. We must preserve our forests, extend, climate change mitigation, and combat deforestation through ecosystem-based approaches to maximize carbon stock hence, forest landscape restoration and management under the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration is critical for climate change mitigation and biodiversity conservation. The prototype development, adoption of best practices, participation, selection of the species and ecosystem in forest landscape restoration, and carbon storage dynamics are the major gaps to be addressed. Additionally, there is a limited understanding of how climate change affects forest landscape restoration, carbon storage potential, and forest resilience in restored landscapes. Therefore, this research topic aims to integrate diverse considerations—socio-cultural factors, silviculture, scientific advancements in carbon monitoring, ecological functionality, and climate change impacts—into the implementation of sustainable forest management. By focusing on forest landscape restoration, the research seeks to assess and enhance the carbon sequestration. Capabilities of forests and refine management practices to support broader climate change mitigation and biodiversity preservation efforts. Thus, there is a need to quantify carbon sequestration rates across various restoration methods.

To further advance our understanding in this area, we encourage submissions that delve into a range of pertinent themes within forest landscape restoration:

· Assessing forest landscape restoration and carbon storage dynamics

· Estimating the carbon sequestration potential of the forest ecosystems and the species

· Impact of deforestation on carbon storage and devising management strategies

· Assessing climate change effects on ecological functionality

· Investigating emerging trends and technologies enhancing forest restoration

Each submission should aim to bridge existing knowledge gaps and contribute to the development of effective, sustainable forest management strategies, thereby supporting global efforts under the UN Decades on Ecosystem Restoration.

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Frontiers in Forests and Global Change

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