Urban Forestry and Sustainable Cities

Dear Colleagues,

Rapid urbanisation and human activities have caused increasingly serious environment problems in urban areas, such as the urban heat island, air and soil pollution, inadequate clean and potable water, and biodiversity loss. According to the World Urbanisation Prospects, t56.61% of the world’s population lives in urban areas and it will increase to 68% by 2050, which is a significant challenge for urban ecosystems that are under pressure following continuing urbanisation, either as land reserve for buildings, or through other negative environmental impacts. Urban forestry is defined as the planting, management, care, and protection of tree populations in urban settings. Urban trees and forests provide people with a huge volume of ecosystem benefits; thus, the creation, conservation, and management of urban forests have been emphasised by governments, scholars, and city residents over the last five decades. However, the development of urban forestry varies among countries; hence, theoretical exploration, methodological innovation, and practical mechanisms are different worldwide.

This Special Issue is focused on the global progress of urban forestry, specifically (i) the theoretical exploration, methodological innovation, and governance intuitional mechanisms of urban forest responses to the changed urban environment; (ii) plants and animals in urban and peri-urban ecosystems; and (iii) urban forest nature-based solutions in city management as pathways to achieve sustainable development goals at the global and local level.

Articles may include any aspect of urban biodiversity conservation, urban forestry governance, climate changes, ecosystem services, urban forest design and planning, etc. This topic, in part, is also an important platform, elucidating the scientific context and output of the Sino-European CLEARING HOUSE project research team (China National Key R&D Program grant no. 2021YFE0193200 and EU Horizon 2020 grant no. 821242). Articles are welcomed from those inside and outside of the CLEARING HOUSE project and from any global region.

Dr. Cheng Wang
Dr. Sumita Ghosh
Dr. Chengyang Xu
Dr. Rik De Vreese
Dr. Clive Davies
Guest Editors

Dr. Jiali Jin
Guest Editor Assistant

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Forests is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.