Most of the time, a forest plantation is defined by how much human involvement there was in setting up and/or running the forest. Because intensive forest management uses a wide range of silvicultural practices, the difference between a semi-natural forest and a forest plantation is often just a matter of taste. To use an old saying, a forest plantation is in the eye of the person who decides what it is.
Asia is by far the place with the most industrial forest plantations. However, most of the resources are found in just a few countries. China, India, and Japan, which have the most industrial forest plantations, make up 77 percent of the area of industrial forest plantations in the region as a whole.
It’s also interesting to note that plantations in each of these three countries are made up of very different kinds of trees. For example, Japan puts a lot of importance on the fact that forests protect people. But this doesn’t usually stop Japan from making round wood, so this analysis classifies all of Japan’s forest plantation areas as industrial forest plantations.
Forestry policy in many countries has pushed for the growth of forest plantations to provide round wood. In some cases, this was done to meet rising demand when natural forest supplies were very low (e.g., forest plantations for wood fuel production in India). In some places, like Indonesia, forest plantations have been seen as an important addition to natural forests or even as a full replacement for them (e.g. New Zealand).
