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https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2025-635
© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2025-635
© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
22 Oct 2025
| 22 Oct 2025
Status: this preprint is currently under review for the journal ESSD.
New FAOSTAT forest emissions and removals estimates: 1990–2025
Abstract. FAOSTAT forest emissions and removals statistics were updated for the period 1990–2025 for 234 countries and territories, using new country data collected via the Forest Resources Assessment (FRA) 2025. The new FAOSTAT estimates align with the published literature, indicating that the world forests were net carbon sinks, storing an additional 140 Gt CO2 in their standing living biomass over the 1990–2025 period, while losing 100 Mha and 17 Gt C through net forest conversion—a proxy used in FAOSTAT for deforestation. For the most recent period available in this release, 2021–2025, the FRA 2025 FAOSTAT estimates of mean annual forest removals were -3.6 Gt CO2 yr-1, only partially offset by net forest conversion losses averaging 2.8 Gt CO2 yr-1, resulting in mean annual net removals of −0.8 Gt CO2 yr-1 during 2021–2025. This net flux had decreased nearly 80 % from mean annual values of −1.4 Gt CO2 yr-1 a decade earlier, during 2011–2015. Forest emissions/removals data independently reported by countries to the United Nations Framework on Climate Change were found to be in good agreement with the FAOSTAT estimates. Data are made available as open access via the Zenodo portal (Tubiello et al., 2025), with DOI 10.5281/zenodo.17395879.
How to cite. Tubiello, F., Pekkarinen, A., Branthomme, A., Piccoli, M., Obli-Laryea, G., Ramadan, N., and Conchedda, G.: New FAOSTAT forest emissions and removals estimates: 1990–2025, Earth Syst. Sci. Data Discuss. [preprint], https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2025-635, in review, 2025.
Competing interests: At least one of the (co-)authors is a member of the editorial board of Earth System Science Data.
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RC1: 'Comment on essd-2025-635', Giacomo Grassi, 11 Dec 2025
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RC2: 'Comment on essd-2025-635', Anonymous Referee #2, 12 Dec 2025
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Review of “New FAOSTAT forest emissions and removals estimates: 1990-2025”, Tubiello et al.
General comments:
This manuscript describes updated forest emissions and removals in FAOSTAT using the latest data in the FRA.
The manuscript is very brief. It left me with many questions, particularly about methods, study limitations, and how FAOSTAT fits with other data sources, particularly NGHGIs. In general, I think each section was terse to the point of lacking key information that would make this a more valuable contribution. I understand that being in ESSD, this is a data description paper (as opposed to an analysis and interpretation of data) but it still does not thoroughly describe the dataset and its production.
Below are some questions I would like to see answered:
- This is an update of previous FAOSTAT emissions and removals data. What were the previous values? How do these compare with the current values? What changed in FAOSTAT’s methods and underlying country data from the previous version to this one?
- How reliable is the time series of fluxes? Do all countries really have consistent timeseries back to 1990? I believe not, but this isn’t discussed anywhere. I know that the authors can’t control country data, but known inconsistencies by time or for specific countries should be mentioned, with potential impacts discussed. Not exploring this makes it hard to assess the validity of the (non-significant) trends in fluxes that the authors claim (e.g., line 166, 172-174). At the least, this needs to be mentioned in Section 2.2, as well as preferably in the results and discussion.
- How do the FAOSTAT estimates relate to NGHGI submissions to the UNFCCC? A table describing their similarities and differences and what countries report in each (at least in principle) would help. Figure 5 shows some substantial differences in fluxes by country. I know you can’t get into all country differences but the main conceptual and methodological similarities and differences between FAOSTAT and NGHGIs are important to explain, as well as one would use one vs. the other. Finally, are NGHGI and FAOSTAT different enough from each other that they represent distinct lines of evidence for forest fluxes (and the forest sink), as implied in lines 179-180? All of this could be covered in the introduction and discussion.
- Where does FAOSTAT fall in terms of covering fluxes from managed vs. unmanaged lands, direct anthropogenic effects, indirect effects, and natural fluxes? And does forest land include any emissions in it (e.g., fires, limited harvests)? This is important for understanding how FAOSTAT compares with other flux estimates and its scope relative to the Global Carbon Budget and NGHGIs. FAOSTAT’s position on this should be explained somewhere.
- You mention an important point with “Thirdly, the computation of net forest conversion emission, based on national-level statistics of area and biomass density as per equation (2), may lead to underestimates of carbon fluxes, so that actual deforestation emissions may be larger than estimated in FAOSTAT.” but don’t follow that thought. I think you’re saying that estimating fluxes over 5-year intervals based on carbon stock changes at a national level may underestimate fluxes. You should explore this point further. What is FAOSTAT missing in terms of emissions and removals by using stock-changes over 5 years instead of annually (e.g., interannual variability)? When are 5-year stock-changes a reasonable or unreasonable proxy for annual data (stock-change or gain-loss)?
Specific comments:
- Gross vs. net: It would be helpful if net emissions and removals were identified as such, to contrast them with the net fluxes.
- Where does non-forest converted to forest get assigned? Is it part of forest land? Either way, that should be explicitly stated. More generally, what is covered by forest land and net forest conversion? Does this vary by country (or over time)?
- How do the FRA and FAOSTAT relate to each other? This is described very briefly in the intro. Is FAOSTAT derived from the FRA itself, or just from the same country data?
- You say that “FAOSTAT statistics of CO2 emissions and removals from forests include estimates of CO2 fluxes on both forest land and on land lost due to net forest conversion. They are computed using carbon stock changes following the IPCC (2006) Tier 3, approach 1 guidelines (Tubiello et al., 2020), based on inputs of forest land area and biomass data from the FRA.” Has every country reported carbon stocks in 1990, 1995, 2000… (5-year intervals)? How does the FRA infer carbon stocks in years that countries don’t report? More generally, how is missing country data filled, if it is? This would be another place to clarify the relationship between FRA and FAOSTAT.
- Please include the uncertainty propagation calculations (and results) mentioned in Section 2.2.
- In “The FAOSTAT data show that forests acted globally as sinks of atmospheric CO2 during the period 1991-2025 (-4.0 Gt CO2 yr-1) and specifically during 2021-2025 (Fig. 2).”, I think this is actually forestland, not forests, which I take to be forestland and NFC combined. Although, I am confused about the difference between the -4.0 and the -3.6 in the next sentence (which is also apparently forestland). Is -3.6 for 2021-2025?
- Where is the NGHGI data coming from, e.g., correlation with FAOSTAT (Section 3.2)? Why is the correlation between NGHGI and FAOSTAT for forestland included in the net forest conversion paragraph (line 142/143)? Aren’t FAOSTAT and NGHGI using similar data at their root (nationally reported data), which would mean that correlations between them are to be expected? A scatterplot of the forestland and NFC NGHGI-FAOSTAT correlations should be included if statistics are provided. Also, might not large forested countries skew this analysis?
- I think that lines like “in particularly removing on average more than -1 Gt CO2 yr-1 during 2001-2025 (-0.4 Gt CO2 yr-1 since 1990)” are confusing. I think this is referring to forestland + NFC, but Table 1 doesn’t show -1 Gt/yr for 2001-2025. Where is -1 Gt/yr coming from?
- What does “but never previously detected with this magnitude” mean (line 178)? Are you saying that this is a larger forestland sink than other approaches estimate? If so, you should explore this.
- Figure 2: I suggest including another set of bars at the right side of the graph to show the 1991-2025 averages (like in Table 1).
- Why does Figure 4 show 10 countries but Figure 5 only show 5 countries?
- To what do you attribute the apparently high correlation between FAOSTAT and NGHGIs in Figure 4 and the lower correlation in Figure 5?
- Given that this dataset ends in 2025, how are 2021-2025 values calculated? I imagine this varies by country but it needs to be explained. Are values from the most recent year extrapolated to 2025? Is the most recent year of data simply extended to 2025?
- Forestland, net forest conversion, and their sum (sometimes you call it forests?) are not consistently used in the paper, table, and figures. Please ensure consistency between them.
Technical corrections:
- Line 84: Missing “for” after “available” in “The updated FAOSTAT dataset makes values available forest emissions/removals estimates by country”.
- Line 89: Zenodo link doesn’t look complete.
- Use of homogenously could be replaced with “equally” (e.g., like 103).
- Line 131: Should this heading also be “Emissions/removals on forest land”, like in line 98?
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2025-635-RC2
Data sets
FAOSTAT Emissions from Forests F. Tubiello https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17395879
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Francesco Tubiello
CORRESPONDING AUTHOR
Statistics Division, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome, 00153, Italy
Anssi Pekkarinen
Forestry Division, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome, 00153, Italy
Anne Branthomme
Forestry Division, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome, 00153, Italy
Michelle Piccoli
Statistics Division, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome, 00153, Italy
Griffiths Obli-Laryea
Statistics Division, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome, 00153, Italy
Nidal Ramadan
Statistics Division, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome, 00153, Italy
Giulia Conchedda
Land and Water Division, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome, 00153, Italy
Short summary
FAOSTAT forest emissions and removals statistics were updated for the period 1990–2025 for 234 countries and territories, using new country data collected via the Forest Resources Assessment (FRA) 2025. This paper presents the new data with global, regional and country trends.
FAOSTAT forest emissions and removals statistics were updated for the period 1990–2025 for 234...
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