# Project

Portal Forest and Climate is the winning solution in the Open Data Challenge - Environment and Us, published by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in partnership with the Office of Information Technology and E-Governance. The portal was developed by:

The original algorithm was developed as part of the Forest and Climate project, which was supported in 2018 by the Ministry of Environmental Protection of the Republic of Serbia. The portal was created based on an advanced version of the algorithm:

$$S = 0,25P+0,20C+0,15M+0,12G+0,09D+0,07F+0,05W+0,04L+0,03R$$

Legend:

S – terrain suitability for afforestation
P - type of land
C - climate conditions (present and future)
M - geomorphological conditions
G - geological background
D - drought
F - fire vulnerability
W - hydrological conditions
L - purpose of land
R - proximity to the road

The formula was obtained by applying an analytical hierarchical process. Areas already covered by forests and protected areas requiring special planning for forest development are excluded from the final results. The algorithm does not consider planning and strategic documents, which is why all users are advised to contact the competent institutions before planting trees.

Creation of the algorithm included the application of geographical information systems, or QGIS freeware. Open data from different platforms (https://data.gov.rs/sr/, https://www.copernicus.eu/en, https://www.diva-gis.org/, etc.) was used, where the end result depends on the quality of the input data.

There are two directions for further development of the portal:

1. Improving the quality of input data that will produce better quality output.
2. Increases in the number of species that will be eligible for afforestation.