China and India Lead in the Greening of the Earth

A recent study by NASA published in the journal Nature Sustainability revealed that the two countries with the world’s biggest populations are responsible for the largest increase in green foliage.

Recent satellite data (2000–2017) reveals that one third of the global vegetated area is greening and five percent is browning. The greening is prominently clustered in seven regions spread across six continents — most notably in China and India, which together account for nearly one third of the observed total net increase in green leaf area globally (China 25 percent and India 6.8 percent). China alone accounts for one quarter of the global net increase in leaf area with only 6.6 percent of the global vegetated area. The greening in China comes from forests (42 percent) and croplands (32 percent).

The study noticed that China is engineering ambitious programs to conserve and expand forests with the goal of mitigating land degradation, air pollution, and climate change.