NEWS

Update 31: Autumn tree planting 2025

Reforestation 2025

This autumn season was a special one. For the first time, we carried out reforestation and educational activities in two different regions, planting thousands of trees and hosting several school workshops, our favourite part of all!

By the end of this autumn planting season, we will have restored a total of 13.8 hectares of fire-damaged forests across Lurë-Dejës Mt. National Park and Korcë Municipality, bringing the number of planted and replanted trees to 8,250 trees, so far.

Lurë

Our plan for this year was to plant new trees in the 2025 area and replace trees in the zones with a low survival rate from the 2024 area, based on the very low survival rate observed during our September monitoring. In April, we replaced 1,200 trees in the 2023 area, and this autumn, we did the first replacement in the 2024 area, hoping for a milder summer in 2025 so that these trees get a better chance of survival and growing strong.

At the end of summer, we conducted several site visits in Lurë to identify a possible new planting site for this year’s reforestation project, since, with last year’s planting, we concluded the zone assigned to us by AdZM Dibër/AKZM, as per the permit obtained in 2022,2023. We are aware that you can’t pick an area when it comes to reforesting high-altitude damaged land, but we keep in mind a few factors when scouting for a new location. First, we ask the regional Administration of the Protected areas where we can operate, then we drive/walk to the areas to check crucial factors such as:

• Accessibility or proximity to an off-road route, is important to us, since we need to transport both workers and trees by car as close as possible to the damaged area.
• Typology of land, verifying if the soil is suitable for planting or if it is too rocky;
• Existing vegetation, verifying if there is any existing vegetation (even young trees) and mapping them;
• Presence or absence of water in the area or nearby; in ideal conditions, its presence would be a positive factor.

The new area where we worked this year was small, ~6 ha, and had existing vegetation. The pockets we “filled” with new trees during this year’s planting covers approximately 3.9 ha. The terrain’s steepness ranges from 11% to 40%, and it is east-south oriented at an altitude of 1,300m above sea level. The rest of the 118a area was planted a few years ago by AdZM Dibër and a private company, and our planting marks the completion of the parcel within the efforts to restore it.

7,050 trees planted and replaced

If you remember, we started this year’s tree replacement series in the 2023 area in April. Read more in Update #27. As part of the planting permit for each area, we also have the obligation to monitor every specific area for at least 3 years and, in case of a low survival rate, replace saplings to maintain a tree survival rate of 70-75%. So in April, we replaced the first 1,200 trees that we had in the tree nursery from the previous year.

Then, from the monitoring completed in September of this year in the 2024 area, we found that the survival rate was very low: only 40.48% of the trees we had planted survived the drought and summer heat. It was curious to note that some monitoring points had a 95-100% survival rate (due to vegetation and soil moisture), while others had a 0% survival rate (due to arid terrain and no vegetation nearby). We are still thoroughly analysing the reasons for these results, which will be covered in a more detailed blog post, but for now, we need to take action.

So we got back to the 2024 area, where we replaced another 3,915 trees from our tree nursery with 35 workers. We still have to finish replacing some trees also in the area planted in Pregj-Lurë, but more on this below in the following steps

At the new location, in the 2025 area, we have planted 1,935 trees so far, but due to the heavy rains, we had to stop work because the terrain became saturated with water. There is still a zone where we have opened holes ready for planting another 500-600 trees.

Voskopojë

Five years ago, we would never have dreamed about a second planting location, and here we are now… doing a recap of the planting season in Voskopojë. How crazy is that?!

We marked the start of our first planting season. Here, together with local community workers and the team from GreenAL, we planted the first Pinus nigra trees in the Korçë region. The terrain we obtained a plating permit for in 2025 is a small, degraded forest of 7.8ha at 1,450m above sea level, previously damaged by fires. Only 2ha are suitable for planting; the rest is either too rocky or already has vegetation.

1,200 trees planted

Although our saplings, planted from seed this spring at the Voskopojë tree nursery, are not yet ready for planting in the forest, we still wanted to plant some trees in the new location. So we brought 1,200 trees grown in our Fushë-Lurë tree nursery to plant in Voskopojë, our first reforestation area in the Korçë region. It felt very special to see this happening!

Like every new start, it went slow but steady. We are happy to have already a local team of workers from Voskpojë and Kurshovë villages, and during the week we stayed in Korçë, we managed to find new contacts from Gjonomadh and Lubonjë villages who seem very interested in working with us both in the tree nursery and in reforestation. This makes us wishful that the Korçë team will grow faster and that planting 10,000 trees will be as easy as in Lurë.

Environmental NAD with GreenAL

Besides planting, this season we also joined GreenAL’s Environmental National Action Day, engaging with partners, institutions, and young people to discuss reforestation, community involvement, and the role of local seeds and seedlings in forest resilience.

We hosted a workshop with the “Voskopojë” elementary school, and AKP joined the event as well. We started the day at the tree nursery, then, after a proper demonstration on how to plant the trees, each student received a young tree as a gift for their school and planted it themselves in the schoolyard. We hope this small gesture sparks a positive chain reaction, starting right there in their school and spreading throughout the community.

Community impact

This autumn, 43 workers were employed to prepare the terrain and plant trees across both reforestation locations in Lurë and Voskopojë.

In Lurë, our largest team counted 35 workers this year, including seven women. Yet this season also revealed a concerning phenomenon affecting the community: many of the younger workers from previous years were no longer living in Lurë. They left the village in search of better opportunities in Tirana or abroad. Each year, we notice the number of people remaining in Lurë growing smaller, which makes the planting and seasonal job opportunities feel even more meaningful to the village.

In Voskopojë, eight workers from the villages of Voskopojë and Krushovë joined us for four days of digging and planting two-year-old Pinus nigra saplings. It was a joy to collaborate with new faces and to notice the subtle differences between the two regions and the people who live there.

For many families in these rural mountain areas, seasonal job opportunities play an important role, not only in restoring forests but also in helping them face the winter months ahead with greater financial security and stability.

School workshops

In Lurë, we hosted a workshop for 18 students and one teacher from “Irfan Hajrullai” elementary school in Peshkopi. Despite the heavy rain the night before, the group joined us in the field for a hands-on learning day. We showed them the different local tree species growing in the tree nursery, our seed collection, and the planting process, while also taking part in tree planting, which they seem to enjoy the most.

In Korçë, nearly sixty students from Preca College attended an interactive workshop session on sustainable reforestation. The discussion covered our monitoring system and its innovative technology, high-altitude tree nursery management and its role in reforestation, and the use of local seeds in climate-smart forestry. The students showed particular interest in the practical side of our work, raising thoughtful questions about how technology supports forest restoration in Albania.

In Voskopojë, thirty-three students and three teachers from the local elementary school visited the tree nursery. The workshop focused on the role of native species in reforestation. The students actively participated in identifying trees growing around their village (mostly Pinus nigra and Fagus sylvatica). They showed particular interest in how those trees look when they are just seeds and when they become seedlings.

What’s next?

As our planting season comes to a close, we are preparing for our final school workshop of the year, with the “Nënë Tereza” school from Rrëshen. Previously planned for the October planting week, but postponed due to the heavy rain. We will welcome them at the Lurë tree nursery late November or early December, and we will conclude the day with a small tree-planting session. What a great way to conclude the year before the Christmas holidays!

Alongside our educational efforts in sustainable reforestation, we are also launching a pilot research project to compare different reforestation methodologies (with seeds, seed balls, and seedlings). This study will help us collect data on germination, seedling survival rates, and maintenance requirements, while also evaluating the costs and efficiency of each method. The findings will be crucial for developing practical guidelines for us and selecting the most suitable restoration techniques for different sites and conditions across Albania.

Finally, we are preparing for a new open lecture series at the Faculty of Forestry Sciences (FSHP), in collaboration with forestry students and professors, planned to begin early in January 2026. The first lecture, focused on Reforestation, will mark the start of a four-part program dedicated to sharing our on-field experience from Trees for Albania’s main programs. Through these sessions, we hope to strengthen the exchange between field practice and academic research, encouraging young forestry professionals to be part of sustainable forestry practices.