Government Forest Management Policies in Algeria: Planting Trees Is Not Enough

Assessment, Institutional Shortcomings and Outlook

Since independence, Algeria has launched a series of major forestry programmes: the Green Dam (Barrage vert) in the 1970s, the National Reforestation Plan launched in 2000, and a renewed push for ecological restoration under way since 2021. On paper, the ambition is real. In practice, our latest investigative report shows a troubling gap between the areas officially announced and the actual ecological state of the forest massifs.

This report sets out an unvarnished assessment: of the more than one million hectares targeted by the National Reforestation Plan alone, roughly half have actually been planted, and among those plantations, survival rates remain highly uneven from one region to another. The Green Dam, despite decades of effort, long favoured the number of hectares planted over monitoring, maintenance and species diversity — a technical choice that left the stands more vulnerable to fires and disease.

Wildfires, in particular, sit at the centre of this analysis. From 2020 to 2024, tens of thousands of hectares went up in smoke every year, with a heavy human toll — more than 100 deaths in 2021 alone. Our report documents how the authorities’ response long focused on the criminal-intent theory, to the detriment of a genuine prevention policy: maintaining the forest massifs, early surveillance, fuel-break clearing. The fires of July 2026, which hit more than thirty wilayas simultaneously, show that this structural shortfall persists despite the aerial resources built up since 2021.

The case of El Kala National Park illustrates this contradiction on its own: classified as a wetland of international importance, yet cut through by the East–West motorway, which irreversibly destroyed part of its most precious ecosystems.

This report does not stop at criticism: it identifies five structural shortcomings and points to a possible way out — genuinely involving local populations and civil society in forest governance, rather than treating them merely as users to be policed.

Read the full report below: “Government Forest Management Policies in Algeria — Assessment, Institutional Shortcomings and Outlook” (July 2026)

1. Preamble

Algeria’s forests are a strategic natural asset despite their limited extent, concentrated mainly in the mountainous, Tell regions of the north. They perform essential functions for the country: soil protection, combating erosion and desertification, preserving biodiversity, regulating water cycles, and supporting rural livelihoods.

Since independence, Algeria has undertaken several major forest protection and restoration programmes: the creation of national parks, the launch of the Green Dam in the 1970s, the National Reforestation Plan, wildfire-control programmes, and, more recently, a renewed push for ecological restoration policies.

However, the recent evolution of forest ecosystems shows a significant gap between the ambitions on display and the results observed. The growth in officially recorded areas does not always reflect the actual ecological state of the forests, their biological diversity, their capacity for regeneration, or their resilience to climate change.

The major fires of recent years have exposed these fragilities. Beyond the human and environmental disasters, they have revealed the limits of a model long oriented toward crisis management rather than prevention, maintenance of the forest massifs, and adaptation to new climate risks.

This report offers a critical analysis of Algeria’s main public forest-management policies. It examines the state of the forest heritage, wildfire-control strategies, reforestation programmes, the management of protected areas, the institutional framework, and the place of local populations in forest governance.

The aim is not merely to assess the actions undertaken, but to analyse their real effectiveness against criteria now recognised by sustainable forest management: the ecological quality of stands, risk prevention, monitoring of results, territorial participation, and capacity to adapt to climate change.

2. Methodology and sources

This report is based on a cross-analysis of institutional, scientific and documentary sources, in order to compare the stated goals of public policy with the results observable on the ground.

The main sources used are:

• Data and reports from the General Directorate of Forests (DGF) and Algerian public administrations;
• Reports from international organisations, notably the FAO, the World Bank and bodies specialised in natural-hazard management;
• Scientific publications and academic research on Mediterranean forest ecosystems, the Green Dam, reforestation and fire management;
• Data available from international conservation bodies and protected-area programmes;
• Analyses by researchers, forestry experts and specialists in environmental policy.

Particular attention was paid to any gaps between official quantitative indicators (reforested areas, afforestation rates, burnt areas) and the qualitative indicators needed to genuinely assess the state of the ecosystems: plantation survival rates, stand diversity, natural regeneration, effective level of protection, and resilience capacity.

Data on fires and forest areas can vary depending on the source and the accounting method used. Where discrepancies exist, the report favours a comparative presentation of the available data rather than a reading based on a single figure.

Finally, this work adopts a public-policy evaluation approach: it does not focus solely on the resources announced or the programmes launched, but on their capacity to produce lasting results in the conservation and restoration of Algeria’s forests.

3. State of Algeria’s forest heritage

3.1. A marginal forest territory in an overwhelmingly desert country

Algeria, with its 2.38 million km², is the largest country in Africa. But 84% of that territory is occupied by the Sahara. All forest formations are concentrated in the northern fringe, roughly 10% of the country’s total area. According to official data from the General Directorate of Forests (DGF), the national forest domain covers 4.1 million hectares — dense forest and maquis scrubland combined — to which are added between 1 and 1.5 million hectares of esparto-grass steppe in the steppe regions. This figure, presented as progress compared with the 3 million hectares recorded in 1962, deserves careful scrutiny, since it includes maquis and degraded scrubland that are “forest” in name only.

Algeria’s forest domain covers approximately 4.1 million hectares.¹ However, this area includes not only natural forests and reforested land, but also close to 1.9 million hectares of maquis and scrubland. Forest stands in the strict sense cover a substantially smaller area. As a result, the official afforestation rate (around 11%) reflects the forest domain as a whole rather than the surface actually covered by dense forest formations.

3.2. Spatial distribution: fragile forest massifs

Algeria’s forest formations are concentrated mainly in five large biogeographic zones. The humid Tell and the coastal massifs (Kabylie, Béjaïa, Jijel, Skikda, Annaba and El Tarf) form the most heavily wooded region of the country. They shelter the main stands of cork oak (Quercus suber), zeen oak (Quercus canariensis), and Afares oak (Quercus afares) — an endemic species of great heritage value — as well as mixed Mediterranean forests with high biodiversity. This region is also the most exposed to forest fires, whose frequency and intensity have increased in recent years.

The central Tell Atlas (Chréa, Blida, Médéa, Tissemsilt) is dominated by Aleppo pine (Pinus halepensis) and holm oak (Quercus ilex), alongside significant local stands of Atlas cedar (Cedrus atlantica), notably in Chréa National Park. These massifs face growing pressure from urbanisation, tourism and fires.

The Aurès and the eastern massifs (Batna, Khenchela, Oum El Bouaghi) form Algeria’s principal domain for the Atlas cedar, alongside Aleppo pine, holm oak and junipers. These mountain ecosystems, located between 1,200 and 2,300 metres in altitude, play an essential role in soil protection and water regulation, but now appear particularly vulnerable to recurring droughts, fires and global warming.

The steppic High Plateaus form a vast transition zone between the Tell and the Sahara. Dominated by esparto-grass (Stipa tenacissima) and wormwood steppe, they have been the focus, since the 1970s, of major reforestation programmes under the Green Dam, mainly based on Aleppo pine, with mixed results depending on ecological conditions and management practices.

Lastly, the Saharan Atlas marks the southern limit of Mediterranean forest formations. Stands there are more open and xerophilic, made up notably of junipers, Barbary thuja (Tetraclinis articulata), Aleppo pine, Atlas pistachio (Pistacia atlantica) and, locally, holm oak. These formations form an essential ecological barrier against desertification and soil erosion.

At the national level, Aleppo pine remains the dominant forest species. It is followed by cork oak (around 230,000 ha), which is both a major ecological asset and the main renewable forest resource through cork production, holm oak (around 220,000 ha), Atlas cedar (close to 30,000 ha) — an emblematic species now weakened by fires — as well as Barbary thuja, various juniper species, and the many Mediterranean maquis formations that mark stages of degradation or transition in Algeria’s forest ecosystems.

3.3. A heritage under constant pressure

The overall picture is worrying: despite reforestation efforts and institutional communication highlighting the positive trend in forest cover since independence, these quantitative indicators do not necessarily reflect an improvement in the ecological state of Algeria’s forests. The growth in planted areas partly masks a qualitative degradation of the ecosystems, characterised by habitat fragmentation, the decline of certain natural stands, and reduced resilience to disturbance.

Algeria’s forests are subject to multiple, cumulative pressures: increasingly frequent and intense fires, overgrazing, illegal logging, urban expansion, desertification, and the growing effects of climate change. These factors undermine the ecosystems’ capacity for natural regeneration. The central challenge, therefore, is not only the quantitative growth of wooded areas, but the preservation of functional, diverse forests capable of withstanding environmental change.

4. Fire policy: a response still dominated by crisis management

4.1. A recurring phenomenon turned national catastrophe

Forest fires are today one of the main threats to Algeria’s forest heritage. Every summer, the massifs in the north of the country — notably in Kabylie, eastern Algeria and the mountainous areas of the Tell — face fire episodes whose intensity tends to increase under the combined effect of climate change, longer drought periods, the build-up of combustible vegetation, and proximity to human settlements.

According to the estimates presented in the joint World Bank–Algerian government report published in 2023, burnt areas average several tens of thousands of hectares per year, with wide variation depending on weather conditions. However, some recent years have seen exceptionally high tolls, revealing the growing vulnerability of forest ecosystems and the limits of existing prevention and firefighting arrangements.

Year	Hectares destroyed	Victims	Wilayas affected	Observations
2020	About 40,000 ha according to several assessments	—	Kabylie, North-East	Season marked by a sharp increase in fires; warning signs ignored
2021	About 90,000 to 100,000 ha depending on the source	More than 100 deaths, including soldiers	Tizi Ouzou, Béjaïa, Khenchela and several eastern wilayas	Exceptional year in terms of the scale of the fires and the human toll — no Canadair water bombers available
2022	Several thousand ha (estimated at 30,000 ha)	Several dozen victims	El Tarf, Béjaïa and other northern regions	Confirmation of the system’s persistent vulnerability (delayed response — unfulfilled promises on water bombers)
2023	Several thousand hectares, notably in Béjaïa	Several victims	Béjaïa and several wilayas	Significant episodes despite the “announced” reinforcement of resources
2024	Hundreds of ha	Several deaths	Tizi Ouzou, Béjaïa	800 firefighters mobilised — still no preventive doctrine

Analysis of these episodes shows that the fire issue can no longer be addressed solely as an emergency-response problem. It also concerns the State’s capacity to develop an integrated policy combining prevention, maintenance of the forest massifs, land-use planning, surveillance, and adaptation to climate change.

4.2. Aerial resources long insufficient given the evolving risk

One of the main weaknesses of Algeria’s wildfire-control strategy concerns specialised aerial resources. During the catastrophic fires of summer 2021, Algeria had no permanent national fleet of water-bomber aircraft comparable to that of several Mediterranean countries exposed to the same risks.

This situation severely limited the capacity for rapid intervention on fires developing in hard-to-reach mountainous areas. Recourse to military assets, helicopters and aircraft leased on an ad hoc basis did not always make it possible to respond to the simultaneous scale of the fires.

Following the 2021 fires, the authorities announced several acquisitions and reinforcements of resources, notably the purchase of water-bomber aircraft. However, implementation delays showed the difficulty of rapidly building an autonomous aerial capacity.

Comparison with other Mediterranean countries shows that effective firefighting relies less on the mere availability of aircraft than on a comprehensive doctrine integrating:

• prevention of fire outbreaks;
• maintenance of forest–settlement interfaces;
• the creation and upkeep of forest tracks;
• early-warning surveillance systems;
• coordination between services.

Algeria has historically favoured an approach centred on intervention after a fire breaks out, whereas the evolving climate now demands a shift toward a more preventive model.

4.3. Fires as revealing the limits of forest governance

The major fires of recent years have also exposed the structural limits of forest management. While the authorities regularly attribute some fire outbreaks to criminal acts, this explanation does not suffice to account for the complexity of the phenomenon.

Mediterranean fires generally result from a combination of several factors:

• extreme weather conditions;
• prolonged droughts;
• build-up of combustible biomass;
• insufficient preventive silvicultural work;
• human pressure on forest areas.

Fighting fires therefore requires an approach that goes beyond simply identifying the immediate causes of outbreaks. It calls for a sustainable policy of forest-massif management, based on prevention, ecological restoration, and improved forest resilience.

The 2021 fires were a major wake-up call to these fragilities. Beyond the human and ecological toll, they raised the question of the overall effectiveness of Algeria’s forest-governance model — a system long oriented toward reacting to disasters rather than anticipating them.

4.4. Reinforced aerial capacity, but built in an emergency

The catastrophic fires of summer 2021 revealed the inadequacy of specialised aerial firefighting resources. At that time, Algeria had no national fleet of water-bomber aircraft comparable to those of the leading Mediterranean countries, which severely limited the speed of intervention on major fires. Since then, the authorities have undertaken a significant effort to reinforce capacity, mobilising AT-802 water bombers, Beriev Be-200 aircraft and heavy helicopters during summer campaigns. However, this modernisation came after the 2021 tragedies and remains chiefly centred on intervention capability. Forest-management specialists stress that an effective policy also rests on prevention: maintaining the forest massifs, creating fuel breaks, early surveillance, forest tracks, brush clearing, and sustainable management of forest areas.

4.5. A response largely centred on the criminal-intent theory

From the very first days of the catastrophic fires of summer 2021, the Algerian authorities favoured the hypothesis of organised criminal acts. President Abdelmadjid Tebboune, the Prime Minister and the security services publicly referred to the actions of “criminal hands.” While the existence of deliberate acts cannot be ruled out, and was upheld by the authorities in several cases, this explanation was not accompanied by the establishment of an independent commission of inquiry tasked with assessing the full range of factors behind the exceptional scale of the disaster. No public expert report has been published on the possible responsibilities linked to fire prevention, the state of the forest massifs, surveillance systems, or the coordination of emergency response.

Several observers considered that the public debate’s focus on the criminal dimension of the fires had pushed into the background questions relating to the preparedness of firefighting services, the shortage of aerial resources available in 2021, forest maintenance, and the adaptation of forest policy to climate change. Yet studies devoted to Mediterranean fires show that the most serious disasters generally result from a combination of several factors: extreme weather conditions, the build-up of plant fuel, the vulnerability of forest stands, insufficient preventive measures and, in some cases, deliberate acts.

The fires of July 2026 show that, despite the investments made since the 2021 disasters, the Algerian government still has not put in place a genuine fire-prevention policy. Within a few days, several hundred fires were recorded in more than thirty wilayas, simultaneously mobilising the resources of Civil Protection, the General Directorate of Forests and the People’s National Army. This situation demonstrates that reinforcing aerial resources is a real step forward, but is not enough on its own to cope with multiple fires across such a vast territory. These recent episodes also underline the importance of a policy oriented more towards prevention: maintenance of the forest massifs, reduction of the fuel load, early surveillance, forest management, and improved ecosystem resilience to climate change.

5. The Green Dam: a political ambition with mixed results

5.1. A pioneering project against desertification

Launched in the early 1970s under President Houari Boumédiène, the Green Dam is one of the largest reforestation programmes ever undertaken in Africa. Its aim was to create a vast vegetated belt of nearly 1,500 kilometres, linking the Moroccan and Tunisian borders, in order to curb desertification of the High Plateaus, protect the farmland of the north, and improve living conditions for rural populations.

This vision rested on an intuition that is now largely confirmed: fighting desertification requires restoring ecosystems. However, implementation of the project quickly revealed the limits of an approach centred essentially on tree planting, without sufficiently integrating the ecological, pastoral and social realities of the territories concerned.

5.2. Questionable technical choices

The early phases of the Green Dam heavily favoured Aleppo pine (Pinus halepensis), a Mediterranean species well suited to dry environments but planted over vast areas, often in a uniform manner. While this species shows good drought resistance, its dominance reduced the ecological diversity of the plantations and increased their vulnerability to fires, pest attacks — notably the pine processionary moth — and the effects of prolonged droughts.

The difficulties encountered were not, however, due solely to the choice of species. Many researchers point out that planting densities were sometimes ill-suited, that certain sites had unfavourable soil conditions, and that maintenance operations (thinning, clearing, protection against grazing) were insufficient. In the absence of genuine silvicultural management, a significant share of the plantations suffered high mortality or poor growth.

5.3. Governance that was not sufficiently adapted

The Green Dam’s limitations stem above all from its governance. Conceived as a vast national reforestation programme, it long favoured quantitative targets, measured in hectares planted, over the long-term survival of forest stands.

The weak involvement of local populations, particularly herders on the High Plateaus, fostered conflicts between reforestation and pastoral use. Overgrazing, illegal logging and lack of surveillance undermined the regeneration of many plantations. The gradual withdrawal of the People’s National Army, which had contributed extensively to the initial work, followed by the security difficulties of the 1990s, accentuated the abandonment of many perimeters, for lack of maintenance and technical follow-up.

Available assessments thus show that the results achieved remained well below the initial ambitions. While several hundred thousand hectares have indeed been reforested over the decades, plantation survival rates and their capacity to form lasting forest ecosystems remain highly variable from one region to another.

5.4. An ambitious relaunch whose results have yet to be demonstrated

Since 2021, the Algerian authorities have launched a relaunch of the Green Dam, presented as a break with earlier approaches. The new programme emphasises diversifying forest species, restoring steppe rangelands, adapting to climate change, improving governance, and giving greater consideration to local populations.

While these directions address the main criticisms voiced for decades by foresters and ecologists, their actual implementation remains difficult to assess. Official communications focus essentially on the number of hectares programmed, planting campaigns and the financial resources mobilised, while little information is available on plantation survival rates, their long-term maintenance, their natural regeneration, or their real contribution to restoring steppe ecosystems.

At this stage, no independent scientific evaluation can confirm that the new strategy has durably corrected the structural weaknesses that limited the results of the historic Green Dam: insufficient silvicultural monitoring, pastoral pressure, weak involvement of local populations, and a long-term management deficit. The relaunch of the Green Dam therefore looks more like a programme whose effectiveness has yet to be demonstrated than a reform whose results are already established. Only ecological monitoring over several years will make it possible to assess whether this new phase constitutes a genuine turning point in forest policy or reproduces the limitations of earlier reforestation campaigns.

6. The National Reforestation Plan: stated ambitions, mixed results

6.1. Ambitious goals, limited achievements

Launched in 2000 for a twenty-year period, the National Reforestation Plan (PNR) was one of the main instruments of Algerian forest policy. It notably aimed to achieve more than one million hectares of plantations and to raise the national afforestation rate.

However, the available assessments show a significant gap between the initial targets and the actual achievements. The areas actually reforested remained well below the announced projections, with around 500,000 hectares completed according to data reported by the forestry services. This gap is not merely a quantitative failure: it also reveals persistent difficulties linked to monitoring, maintenance and the long-term survival of plantations.

The success of a reforestation programme does not depend solely on the number of trees planted, but on their capacity to survive and become durably integrated into the ecosystems. In several regions, survival rates remain low owing to water stress, grazing, fires and insufficient post-planting maintenance operations.

6.2. A policy long assessed by plantings rather than by results

One of the main limitations of Algeria’s reforestation policies lies in the predominance of a quantitative approach. The indicators used have long favoured the number of hectares treated or seedlings planted, whereas the essential ecological criteria are plantation survival, soil restoration, natural regeneration, and the creation of functional ecosystems.

This approach can lead to prioritising short-term, visible operations at the expense of long-term forest management. Yet a recent planting does not immediately constitute a forest: it requires several years of monitoring, protection and silvicultural intervention before it can fulfil real ecological functions.

The main challenge, therefore, is not only to plant more, but to ensure the long-term survival of existing plantations and their adaptation to local climatic conditions.

6.3. An underdeveloped timber industry and limited economic incentives

Sustainable forest management also depends on economic and social value creation. Unlike several Mediterranean countries that have developed structured timber industries, Algeria has a still-limited forest economy, despite significant resources such as cork oak, Aleppo pine, and certain non-timber forest products. For example, since cork harvesting was handed over to concession holders without rigorous technical oversight, it has become one of the causes of decline in the exploited cork-oak stands.

This weak economic value creation reduces the economic incentives to protect forest areas. Rural populations living near forests rarely benefit from a genuinely organised forest economy capable of generating lasting interest in resource conservation.

Forest protection therefore cannot rest solely on administrative surveillance. It also requires creating mechanisms that allow local populations to become partners in forest management, through economic activities compatible with conservation: cork value-chains, ecotourism, non-timber forest products, organised livestock rearing, and rangeland restoration.

7. National parks: regulatory protection confronted with the limits of actual management

7.1. A network of protected areas with limited resources

Algeria has 10 national parks in the north of the country, covering a total area of 165,362 hectares, all placed under the authority of the Ministry of Agriculture. Seven of them are classified as UNESCO Man and the Biosphere (MAB) Reserves — an international distinction that contrasts painfully with their actual state of management. Indeed, Algeria’s national parks remain exposed to multiple pressures: fires, urbanisation, infrastructure, illegal resource extraction, overgrazing, and uncontrolled tourist visitation. The gap between protected status and real management capacity is today one of the main weaknesses of the system.

National park	Area	MAB Reserve	Documented threats	Management problem
Djurdjura	18,550 ha	Yes	Recurring fires, urbanisation	Illegal logging, peripheral overgrazing
El Kala	76,438 ha	Yes	East–West motorway, wetland pollution, and unchecked urban sprawl	Partially destroyed by road infrastructure
Chréa	26,250 ha	Yes	Urban pressure, uncontrolled tourism	Tourist facilities within the protected zone
Taza (Jijel)	3,807 ha	Yes	Poaching, illegal dumping	Pressure from neighbouring population growth
Belezma	26,250 ha	Yes	Overgrazing, illegal logging	Cedars under threat, staff shortage
Théniet El Had	3,425 ha	Yes	Poaching, quarries	Mining concessions in buffer zones
Gouraya	2,080 ha	Yes	Coastal urbanisation, tourism	Uncontrolled land pressure
Tlemcen	8,225 ha	Pending	Pollution, agriculture	MAB classification still pending
Djebel Aïssa National Park	24,400 ha	—	Desertification	—
Babor-Tababort National Park	23,000 ha	—	—	—

7.2. The case of El Kala: the contradiction between infrastructure development and conservation

El Kala National Park is the most glaring example of the contradiction between the Algerian State’s protection rhetoric and its actions. This park, located at the country’s extreme north-east, is home to wetlands of international importance (classified under the Ramsar Convention), exceptional Mediterranean biodiversity, and remarkable cork-oak forests.

Yet the construction of Algeria’s new East–West motorway — a showcase project of the Bouteflika-era public works programme — cut through this park, irreversibly destroying part of its most precious ecosystems. This decision illustrates the Algerian State’s hierarchy of priorities: infrastructure takes precedence over nature protection, even in supposedly the most protected zones.

To this should also be added the chaotic and reckless development — centralised in principle, yet left to the discretion of local authorities — that runs contrary to the most basic rules governing human activity and infrastructure.

7.3. Management resources insufficient against growing pressures

The day-to-day management of national parks continues to face significant constraints in staffing, equipment and financial resources. The tasks assigned to park managers are numerous: surveillance, fire prevention, scientific monitoring, visitor reception, use control, and biodiversity protection.

In several parks, human pressures remain significant: uncontrolled grazing, illegal logging, poaching, illegal dumping and urban expansion. These difficulties reflect less an absence of regulation than a shortage of resources needed to sustainably enforce protection objectives.

7.4. The need for a new approach involving local populations

One of the historic limitations of protected-area management in Algeria lies in an approach long based primarily on regulation and administrative control. Yet international experience shows that sustainable conservation requires the involvement of local communities.

Local populations should not be seen solely as a source of pressure on natural areas, but as potential partners in their protection. Developing activities compatible with conservation — ecotourism, the promotion of non-timber forest products, craftwork, organised livestock rearing and rural projects — is an essential condition for building a positive relationship between protected territories and their inhabitants.

The central question facing Algeria’s national parks is therefore not only one of legal protection status, but of the capacity to turn these areas into territories that are genuinely managed, monitored and integrated into their social environment, always with a conservation objective that must take precedence in the actions undertaken.

8. The institutional and legislative framework: between administrative centralisation and the need for reform

8.1. The General Directorate of Forests: a central institution facing growing responsibilities

The General Directorate of Forests (DGF) is the central institution of Algerian forest policy. Placed under the authority of the ministry responsible for Agriculture, it relies on a network of wilaya-level forest conservation offices tasked with implementing protection, development and surveillance policies for forest areas.

Its remit covers a very broad field: management of forest and esparto-grass heritage, erosion control, fire prevention, forest policing, restoration of degraded areas, and monitoring of reforestation programmes.

However, the evolution of forest-related challenges has considerably expanded these responsibilities. Faced with the effects of climate change, rising fire risk, human pressure, and ecological-restoration needs, the central question remains that of the adequacy between the tasks entrusted to the forest administration and the human, technical and financial resources at its disposal.

8.2. Governance marked by a multiplicity of actors

Forest and fire management today involves numerous actors: the General Directorate of Forests, Civil Protection, local-authority services, environmental bodies, the People’s National Army during major crises, and organisations tasked with risk management.

This plurality of actors is necessary given the complexity of current risks. However, it requires permanent coordination and a clear division of responsibilities. Several institutional analyses have highlighted that coordination difficulties between prevention, surveillance, intervention and restoration constitute a significant limitation on the effectiveness of public policy.

The challenge, therefore, is not to reduce the number of actors, but to build integrated governance combining risk prevention, forest management and land-use planning.

8.3. A necessary but still unfinished legislative reform

Algerian authorities have for several years announced a reform of the forest legislative framework to adapt it to new economic, social and climate challenges. This evolution appears necessary, since current challenges go well beyond the mere administrative protection of forests.

The legal framework must now integrate several new dimensions: adaptation to climate change, participatory management, valuing ecosystem services, involving local populations, and developing economic activities compatible with conservation.

One of the historic limitations of forest regulation lies in its predominantly repressive orientation. Forest policing remains an indispensable tool against illegal encroachment on resources, but it cannot on its own constitute a sustainable conservation strategy. Modern forest policies also rest on mechanisms of incentive, partnership with populations, and jointly managed territories.

The success of a forest reform will therefore depend not only on the adoption of new legislation, but above all on its capacity to concretely transform management practices on the ground.

9. Civil society and local populations: actors still insufficiently integrated into forest management

9.1. A historically centralised forest governance

Since independence, Algerian forest policy has rested mainly on a centralised administrative model in which the State retains the dominant role in planning, regulation and programme implementation.

This organisation has made it possible to run large national reforestation and forest-protection programmes. However, it has also shown its limits in territories where the challenges exceed the intervention capacity of the administration alone.

Rural populations living near forests have long been regarded more as beneficiaries of public policy, or as users to be controlled, than as management partners. Yet international research on natural-resource governance shows that conservation is generally more effective when local communities take part in decisions and directly benefit from ecosystem protection.

9.2. Still-limited participation by environmental civil society

Algeria has an active environmental associative fabric, involved notably in awareness-raising, biodiversity protection and mobilisation during ecological crises. However, its involvement in shaping public policy remains limited.

Associations often play a supporting, awareness-raising or alert role, but rarely participate in an institutionalised way in developing forest strategies, protected-area management plans, or major development projects likely to affect ecosystems.

The main issue, therefore, is not the total absence of civil society, but the absence of permanent mechanisms allowing this associative expertise to be turned into genuine participation in public decision-making.

9.3. Integrating local populations: a condition for the success of forest policies

The relative exclusion of local populations from forest governance can have counter-productive effects. When rural communities perceive the forest solely as a space subject to prohibitions, with no associated economic or social benefit, protection measures lose part of their legitimacy.

Conversely, international experience shows that involving local populations in surveillance, habitat restoration and the sustainable use of forest resources can significantly improve conservation outcomes.

In Algeria, several local initiatives have shown the value of a participatory approach, notably in certain areas of Kabylie and the Aurès. However, these experiences remain limited and have not yet led to a genuine shift in the governance model.

The sustainable protection of Algeria’s forests will therefore require moving from a mainly administrative, control-based logic to a territorial approach bringing together the State, local authorities, associations and rural communities.

10. Conclusion — A forest heritage weakened by a lack of coherence, governance and evaluation

Analysis of Algeria’s public forest-management policies leads to a worrying conclusion: Algeria has a limited but strategic natural heritage, a specialised administration, a substantial set of programmes, and a developed regulatory framework. Yet the results achieved remain well below the stated ambitions.

The main weakness lies not in a lack of initiatives, but in the difficulty of turning announced programmes into lasting results. Forest management remains marked by an often-quantitative approach, centred on reforested areas or resources mobilised, whereas the true indicators of success are plantation survival, ecosystem restoration, resilience to climate change, and the integration of local territories.

Five structural shortcomings emerge from this analysis:

1. Fire prevention still insufficiently adapted to the evolving climate risk, as large-scale fires have become more frequent and more destructive, as shown by the successive crises of 2021, 2022 and the years that followed.
2. Limited results from the major reforestation programmes, notably the Green Dam and the National Reforestation Plan, owing to attention long focused more on planting targets than on maintenance, ecological monitoring and the long-term survival of stands.
3. A network of protected areas with strong legal recognition but facing management difficulties, linked to a lack of resources, land pressures, infrastructure, and uncontrolled uses.
4. A response still insufficiently integrated in the face of desertification and climate change, even as Algeria’s Mediterranean forest ecosystems are among the most vulnerable to prolonged droughts, fires and land-use change.
5. Still-limited participation by local populations and civil society in forest governance, even though international experience shows that sustainable conservation rests on involving territorial actors and creating economic incentives compatible with protecting natural resources.

The challenge for the future, therefore, is not merely to increase wooded areas or multiply planting programmes. It is to change the model: to move from a policy that is mainly administrative and based on quantitative targets to a genuine policy of sustainable territorial management, combining scientific expertise, operational resources, local participation, and transparent evaluation of results.

Algeria’s forests do not lack only trees; above all, they lack a long-term strategy capable of ensuring their survival, renewal, and integration into the country’s ecological and social balance.