Italy has extensive forests covering nearly 11 million hectares, which accounts for 36.4% of the country’s total land area. That means more than a third of Italy is forested, a figure that surprises many people who picture the country as mostly coastline, vineyards, and ancient cities. Even more striking: Italy’s forests are growing. Forest cover has expanded from 27.8% in 1985 to 36.4% in 2015, and that upward trend has continued into the 2020s.
How Much of Italy Is Forested
Italy’s 11 million hectares of forest make it one of the more densely wooded countries in Europe. For context, that’s roughly the size of Virginia and Maryland combined. The growth over the past few decades is largely the result of agricultural land being abandoned in rural and mountainous areas, allowing trees to reclaim hillsides and valleys naturally. Italy is one of a handful of European countries where forest area continued to increase as recently as 2023.
About 22% of Italy’s total land area falls within some form of legal protection. The country operates 24 national parks, along with hundreds of state and regional reserves and thousands of sites designated under the European Union’s Natura 2000 conservation network. Many of these overlap, creating layers of protection for forested landscapes from the Alps to Sicily.
Where the Forests Are
Italian forests are not spread evenly across the country. The top six regions account for more than half of all tree cover. Tuscany leads with about 1.1 million hectares, making it by far the most forested region. Piedmont follows with roughly 830,000 hectares, then Sardinia at 820,000, Trentino-Alto Adige at 750,000, and Calabria at 690,000. The national average is around 470,000 hectares per region, so these top areas are well above the norm.
This distribution reflects Italy’s geography. The northern Alps, the central Apennine mountain spine, and the rugged interiors of islands like Sardinia all support dense woodland. Flat, heavily farmed areas like the Po Valley in the north have far less forest cover, as that land has been cultivated for centuries.
Tree Species From Alps to Mediterranean
Italy stretches across multiple climate zones, so its forests vary dramatically from north to south and from sea level to high altitude. In the Alps, European larch dominates at higher elevations. European beech is considered a keystone species across Italian mountain environments, thriving in both the Alpine arc and the Apennines. In the central and southern Apennines, beech forests do well above 1,500 meters.
Lower elevations in the Apennines are home to Turkey oak, which is well suited to the warmer, drier conditions of central Italy. More generalist species like downy oak and manna ash occupy broader ranges across varying elevations and climates. Along the southern coasts and lower slopes, maritime pine is increasingly prominent and is considered a strong candidate for future forest composition as temperatures rise.
Several of Italy’s old-growth beech forests are part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site, a transnational designation shared across 18 European countries called the Ancient and Primeval Beech Forests of the Carpathians and Other Regions of Europe. These are among the oldest and least disturbed forest ecosystems on the continent.
Why Italian Forests Keep Growing
The steady expansion of Italian forests over the past 40 years is tied to a few key factors. Rural depopulation has been the biggest driver. As younger generations moved to cities, farmland in hilly and mountainous areas was left untended. Trees moved in naturally, converting former pastures and terraced fields back into woodland. This process, sometimes called “passive rewilding,” has reshaped entire landscapes in regions like Liguria, Calabria, and the interior Apennines.
Reforestation programs have also contributed, particularly in areas prone to landslides and erosion. Italy’s mountainous terrain makes slope stabilization a practical concern, and planting trees is one of the most effective tools. That said, the majority of forest gain has been spontaneous rather than planned.
Carbon Storage and Climate Role
Italian forests play a measurable role in absorbing carbon dioxide. In 2022, the carbon stored by Italy’s forests increased by 6.2 million tonnes of carbon, equivalent to roughly 22.6 million tonnes of CO₂ pulled from the atmosphere. That offsets a meaningful share of the country’s annual emissions, though not all of them.
There is a complication, however. While Italy’s total forest area has continued to grow, timber volume in existing forests has in some cases declined. This can happen when trees are harvested faster than they regrow, when drought or disease weakens stands, or when wildfires reduce biomass. So more forest land does not automatically mean more carbon storage, and maintaining healthy, mature forests matters as much as expanding their footprint.
Forests and Climate Change in Italy
Rising temperatures are already reshaping where different tree species can survive in Italy. The tree line in mountain areas is expected to shift upward, which could squeeze out beech forests in the northern Alps and northern Apennines while actually improving conditions for beech at higher elevations further south. European larch in the Alps and Turkey oak in the Apennines are both expected to adapt relatively well and could play important roles in maintaining forest cover as conditions change.
In the southern Apennines, maritime pine is emerging as a species likely to expand its range. Hotter, drier summers across the Mediterranean basin favor drought-tolerant species, potentially changing the character of southern Italian forests over the coming decades. The overall picture is not one of forest loss but of forest transformation, with species gradually shifting to match new climate realities at different altitudes and latitudes across the peninsula.