How Digital Platforms Transform Forest Restoration Activities Globally

The incipient use of digital technologies to reverse land degradation reveals critical equity and justice concerns.

A growing number of digital technologies are increasingly aligned with an international goal to restore 350 million hectares of degraded land by 2030. Our recently published research article in the journal Environmental Politics examines how digital platforms exert a power dynamic in restoration activities. A wide range of digital devices and techniques promise a new model for restoring hundreds of millions of hectares of degraded lands globally. Examples include digital systems for mapping degraded landscapes, robotics for tree planting, and mobile applications for identifying and selecting plant species for restoration . At the same time, our recent assessment shows how digital platforms influence decision-making processes that can create or exacerbate unequal power dynamics in knowledge production, financing, and market practices.

As part of a global search, we identified and tested 55 digital platforms applied to restoration activities to understand their operation. These platforms include multi-user databases, geospatial mapping and planning, smartphone apps, gaming, blockchain systems, crowd-funding networks , and social media. You can see the full list of selected platforms here. In analyzing these platforms, we identified four socio-political drivers of technology developments. You can learn more about each of them below.

Scientific knowledge to optimize forest restoration operations.

This first digital development driver highlights the role of scientific knowledge in maximizing tasks to implement ambitious international restoration goals. Scientific expertise for restoration produces and organizes technologies to forecast scenarios, select feasible methods and create supposedly cost-effective interventions. For example, international environmental NGOs launched the restoration -platforms/">Atlas of Forest and Landscape Restoration Opportunities in 2011 to identify priority degraded lands to be restored globally. Another example is the restoration - monitoring /">Framework for Ecosystem Restoration Monitoring, a geospatial platform that measures the progress of restoration actions. While these digital platforms can help achieve international commitments, these developments often fail to incorporate local knowledge and site-specific issues when planning where and how restoration should be undertaken.

Global digital networks for capacity building.

In the form of collaborative channels, these capacity-building networks interconnect diverse stakeholders for data collection, resource sharing, and communication . These digital networks aim to decentralize information, promote collaboration, and support access to financial resources for restoration projects. For example, the Restor platform is a digital network that connects professionals and organizations managing restoration actions worldwide. The Land Accelerator program is another example of an international channel that connects multiple stakeholders to mobilize resources for projects at the local level. These platforms provide tools to manage systems and resources to support decision-making processes, which in turn generate specific models and practices for restoration actions. At the same time, there are a number of ethical and sovereignty issues related to how these systems impose certain practices and use data, especially when these datasets are applied to develop carbon markets, for example.

Digital tree planting markets to manage restoration supply chains.

Our study also identified emerging restoration markets that are materializing through digital supply chains that connect stakeholders to commercial arrangements. Through digitally enabled networks , the British online platform , the TreeApp, supports the planting of hundreds of thousands of trees each year. This mobile app encourages users to pay attention to ads from various brands to generate credits for tree planting across 14 projects in the southern hemisphere. These digital restoration platforms generate simple infrastructures for individuals and businesses to offset carbon emissions. However, they often present a potential disconnect with current restoration practices on the ground, which could work to develop meaningful livelihood improvements and transparent restoration actions.

Community participation in the co-creation of restorative practices

Digital platforms are also a critical component of the various restoration initiatives and practices of community stakeholders in day-to-day experiences. Community-led restoration actions adopt digital platforms to enhance communication processes among local stakeholders, to activate and mobilize regional restoration networks . These restoration groups and community networks are, for example, present on social media to share practices, lessons and struggles that help to share experiences and improve restoration actions. In Brazil, a collaboration between community seed providers led to the development of networks /redario/">Redário, a national platform , which aims to support regional restoration networks . Redário has co-produced a seed supply management platform to coordinate the commercial operations of seed suppliers with restoration markets. It should be noted that the co-creation process is not a simple participatory activity, and may not always include the diversity of local values, interests and financial goals.

These four drivers of technological developments highlight how digital platforms can shape restoration projects. This study suggests the need for critical attention to these nascent environmental technologies to understand how knowledge and expertise are encoded in platform policy. Such platform -driven restoration actions can contribute to and increase inequity issues in implementing restoration initiatives at various scales.

For more information, you can access the full open access article at:

Urzedo, Danilo, Westerlaken, Michelle, and Gabrys, Jennifer. "Digitizing Forest Landscape Restoration: A Social and Political Analysis of Emerging Technological Practices." Environmental Politics. DOI: 10.1080/09644016.2022.2091417.

To cite this story: Urzedo, Danilo, "How Digital Platforms Transform Global Forest Restoration Actions," Smart Forests Atlas (2022), https://atlas.smartforests.net/en/stories/how-digital-platforms-transform- global-forest- restoration -actions.

Header image credit: Screenshot from Plant-for-the-Planet's promotional video , "The Place Where Confidence Grows," (July 16, 2020). Image Source: Plant-for-the-Planet [screenshot]. Captured on July 28, 2022, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ENpHkc2AAQ/.