Planting trees could lead to more droughts in parts of US and Asia: Chinese-led study
Researchers find that in nearly half of the world, soil moisture levels fell as vegetation cover increased
Planting trees in some parts of the world could cause droughts, according to a Chinese-led study that suggested greening efforts should take regional conditions into account to be effective.
Through a complex multi-decade study of vegetation and soil moisture patterns combining several databases and models, the researchers found that nearly half of the world had experienced a pattern of “greening-drying.”
This included parts of the United States, Central Asia, Central Africa, inland Europe, southern Australia and South America, where increasing vegetation cover resulted in a drop in soil moisture levels.
Other places, including China, saw a mixture of both patterns.
“Our study provides a robust and comprehensive assessment of the widespread impacts of global vegetation greening on soil drought,” the team wrote in a paper published in the peer-reviewed journal Communications Earth & Environment last month.