How many of them survived more than a year?

Many of them. Do you have information about it that the rest of us don't?

"Fifty million trees planted- the government said in 2014- with a success rate of 61% compared to the average European planting success rate of 35%."

> Do you have information about it that the rest of us don't?

No, that's why I asked. I was aware of the less than perfect record elsewhere wondered if they had done better.

i imagine most of them, Macedonia is not such a dangerous place to live. /s

Planting trees results in inferior forests. A healthy forest comes from natural forestation that goes through pioneer species stages.

Inferior forests are better than no forests.

You don’t have to take an empty field and plant 100k trees. You can go to where chestnuts used to grow, have some volunteers plant some over time, say 100 every month in an area. Over the course of 10 years, we’ll get some data.

Don’t let great be the enemy of good.

A healthy forest comes from strict conservation laws, confiscation, expropriation, etc. When land is secured, what to plant is a technical detail.

Achieving a good approximation of pristine natural forests might have a lower priority than the variable needs to increase rare plants, provide an habitat for rare animals, make the forest robust against climate and geological hazards, dealing with people with friendly (e.g. edible fruit) or hostile (e.g. thick vegetation to discourage secret hemp cultivation) features, etc.