Expanding Scotland’s native woodland

Scotland’s native woodlands are one of our greatest national assets: shaping our landscapes, supporting wildlife, storing carbon and enriching communities across the country.

Yet despite their importance, our ancient woodlands are not being cared for properly and are disappearing at an alarming rate. Efforts to create new woodland – the ancient woodlands of the future – are simply too slow.

Today, native woodland covers only a small fraction of Scotland, and much of it survives in isolated fragments rather than healthy, connected ecosystems. While decades of conservation work have slowed historic losses, the next Scottish Parliament will need to move faster and think bigger if we are to truly deliver Mair Trees Please.

The Scottish Government has repeatedly set ambitious tree-planting targets – and that ambition is welcome. But targets alone are not enough. Year after year, planting goals have been missed, leaving Scotland behind on both climate and nature commitments.

To get woodland expansion back on track, Scotland should be creating at least 18,000 hectares of new woodland annually, with no less than half made up of native species. Planting will remain essential, but the future must increasingly rely on natural regeneration – allowing woods to expand and connect organically where conditions are right. This approach creates richer habitats, strengthens resilience to climate change and often delivers better long-term outcomes for nature.

Achieving this scale of change requires the Forestry Grant Scheme (FGS) to work harder for native woodland. As Scotland’s primary funding mechanism for woodland creation and management, the FGS plays a decisive role in shaping what gets planted, and where.

Ringfencing funding specifically for native woodland creation would help ensure expansion benefits biodiversity as well as climate goals, delivering maximum value for public money. Prioritising projects that link existing woods together would deliver particularly strong ecological gains, allowing wildlife to move, adapt and recover across landscapes.

New grant options could also unlock woodland creation in places currently underrepresented, including:

• river and riparian corridors
• upland and montane habitats
• towns and cities
• farms and crofts through low-density tree planting.

Done well, woodland expansion can sit alongside food production, supporting soils, livestock welfare and farm resilience. It can even increase farm productivity.

But planting new trees is only half the story. Around 70% of Scotland’s ancient woodland is currently in poor condition, damaged by grazing pressure, intensive land use, inappropriate development, invasive species and disease. As we redouble efforts to create new woodland, we risk quietly losing the irreplaceable habitats that already exist.

Ancient woodlands are more than just trees. They are ecosystems that have evolved over centuries – sometimes millennia – supporting extraordinary biodiversity both above and below ground.

They are also climate assets. Mature woodland stores vast amounts of carbon, while ancient woodland soils can hold significantly more carbon than newly-planted sites. Once lost, these systems cannot simply be recreated by planting elsewhere.

With ancient woodland covering only around 2% of Scotland’s land, every remaining site matters.

Much of Scotland’s ancient woodland lies on privately-owned land, meaning restoration currently depends largely on voluntary action. Woodland Trust Scotland argues that this is no longer enough.

A combination of stronger legislation and targeted incentives could ensure landowners are supported – and required – to bring ancient woodland into favourable ecological condition. Restoration should become the norm, not the exception. Sustaining biodiversity is no longer enough – every landowner in Scotland can and should be increasing biodiversity.

Mair Trees Please sets out a clear vision for the next Scottish Parliament: expand native woodland at scale, connect fragmented habitats and protect ancient woods before they are lost forever.
Scotland has the knowledge, public support and natural potential to restore thriving woodland landscapes once again. The challenge now is political will – turning ambition into delivery and ensuring that future generations inherit a country richer in trees, wildlife and opportunities than the one we see today.