FAO is currently providing assistance to strengthening the resilience of Zagros oak and Caspian boxwood trees, the most important and popular tree species in western and northern Iran.
The project, which started in 2015 and has a total budget of 360000 USD, aims to provide technical support for the development of a comprehensive national program of work for the control of boxwood dieback in the Caspian region. It will also help build an effective national forest monitoring system in order to perform more accurate assessments to track the spread of oak dieback (i.e. the gradual dying of a tree starting at the tips as a result of various diseases or climatic conditions).
Over the last five years, changes in climate, including temperature, precipitation, winds and pathogenic fungi have led to the decline and degradation of these resources.
