Less than 20 per cent of land covered by forest

Cyprus is one of the five EU countries where less than 20 per of the land is covered by forest, the latest Eurostat figures show.

In 2020, only around 1 per cent of land was covered by forest in Malta and less than a fifth of land was forested in the Netherlands (10 per cent), Ireland (11 per cent), Denmark (15 per cent) and Cyprus (19 per cent).

In five EU member states, more than half of the land area was covered with forests: Finland (66 per cent), Sweden (63 per cent), Slovenia (61 per cent), Estonia (54 per cent) and Latvia (53 per cent).

In 2020, the EU had an estimated 159 million hectares of forests. Their area has increased by almost 10 per cent since 1990, Eurostat reported.

This means 38 per cent of land in EU countries was covered by forests in 2020.