How the trees are planted - and which species?

There are several methods to plant trees, the most common ones are direct seeding: putting several seeds in holes in the ground in a time that has several months of rain ahead and first growing the seeds in sacks until they have a height of between 40-60 cm and then transport and plant them with the earth around the roots in holes. Depending on the area we usually plant between 1000 and 2000 seedlings per hectare. Seeds could be up to 20.000 per hectare. 

Let me quote from an article about reforestation: ‘’choosing species for reforestation programs or community forestry in species-rich tropical rainforest ecosystems is a complex task. Reforestation objectives, social preferences, and ecological attributes must be balanced to achieve landscape restoration.

The type of species is decided by the arborist in coordination with the local people and it depends most of all on the soil type and humidity of the soils. For instance close to a river on a rich carbon soil different species will be planted than on a sandy soil that dries out in the dry months. In general a mix of between 10 and 20 types of trees will be planted in the mix. Closer to villages we might add more edible fruit bearing trees and a smaller number of hardwoods that could be used after a few decades for wood. On very degraded soils we will decide for pioneer species who are nitrogen fixing, such as cecropia and inga species. The choice also depends on the kinds of seeds available in the area.