Trees: Huntingdon
The question
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment has she made of the potential implications for her polices of trends in levels of tree canopy cover in Huntingdonshire since 2022.
Answered by Mary Creagh
The Government is committed to increasing England’s tree canopy and woodland cover to at least 16.5% by 2050. This is supported by an interim target to achieve an increase of 0.33% of land area by December 2030 from the 2022 baseline of 14.9%.
The tree canopy and woodland cover metric is an aggregate indicator comprising a number of different datasets reporting both tree canopy gain and loss. A calibrated analysis of change in the indicator since 2022 is not yet available. However, updates to some of the individual datasets are available in part for some of these years and, in the case of Huntingdonshire, 16 hectares of new woodland were reported as planted between 1 April 2022 and 31 March 2025, as well as 2,100 individual trees outside woodland that, in time would be expected to contribute a total of about 19 hectares of tree canopy and woodland cover towards the target.
The Forestry Commission is looking to develop regional advisory targets for forestry based on opportunities in the low sensitivity map for woodland creation to provide greater granularity in how the national target to increase tree canopy and woodland cover to 16.5% by 2050 could be achieved.
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