Bainbridge Island, WA -- (SBWIRE) -- 01/16/2012 -- Forestry Research Associates (FRA) has stated its support for a campaign in the UK to embark upon a major reforestation programme in Britain.

Our Forests is an organization that hopes to return the UK to the point it was at 1,000 years ago, in terms of the amount of land covered in forests. The plan is to increase forest coverage to 15 per cent of the land, from the current coverage of just under 10 per cent.

“We always support reforestation programmes,” claimed FRA’s analysis partner, Peter Collins. “Increasing forest cover in the UK will help the country to reduce its carbon emissions through CO2 sequestration.”

Our Forests is a group set up in response to controversial and eventually scrapped plans by the UK government to sell off some of Britain’s forests to private buyers. The group and FRA, a research and analysis consultancy based in the US, claim that adding new forests to the UK will not only contribute to the cutting of carbon emissions but could also create community forests on the edges of towns, while jobs will also be created.

Our Forests is led by Dr Gabriel Hemery, who claims the forest cover in the UK should be returned to the levels recorded in the Domesday Book: "Getting all our woods working, so that they provide the wealth of renewable resources and rich variety of wildlife they are capable of supporting, is vital.”

FRA supports these kinds of reforestation projects in developing countries, such as Brazil, where new forests are being planted in order to try to undo some of the destruction caused by deforestation. Investment firms like Greenwood Management offer foreigners the chance to invest in these projects, which plant non-native plantations as an alternative to using native trees in timber and charcoal production.