UK Forestry Planting and Restocking Statistics, 1976-2020

1976 to 2020 of new planting and restocking data for the United Kingdom, broken down by constituent country, planting type, tree species, and land ownership sector. The dataset is a revised version supporting the official 'Forestry Statistics and Forestry Facts & Figures' National Statistics releases. It provides a long-term record for analyzing trends in woodland creation and management across Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

Use Cases

• Tracking national and regional afforestation trends over time based on the 44-year time series.
• Comparing planting activity between public and private forestry sectors using the owner-type breakdown.
• Analyzing shifts in species composition (conifers vs. broadleaves) for new planting and restocking.
• Assessing progress towards woodland creation targets in England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland using the geographic breakdown.

Strengths

• Covers a 44-year time series from 1976 to 2020, providing a long-term perspective.
• Offers multi-dimensional breakdowns by geography, planting type, species, and ownership.
• Serves as a revised, official source supporting UK National Statistics publications.

Limitations

• Specific column names, row counts, and file sizes are not provided in the available metadata.
• The data is not current, with the latest reference year being 2020.
• License and author information is missing from all source descriptions.

Provenance

Source

Forestry Commission (UK)

Collection Method

Likely compiled from administrative records of planting grants and approvals.

Time Range

1976 to 2020

Freshness

Metadata last updated on 2026-06-29, but the data itself covers the period up to 2020.

Geography

United Kingdom, with breakdowns for England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, GB, and UK.