Throughout history, humans have cut down trees and planted trees to meet their needs. This is one of the benefits of trees! If humans remove more trees than they plant, however, the size of the forest will shrink. FAO wanted to know whether Earth is losing, gaining, or keeping about the same amount of forests over time. Be sure to check out the lesson plans for both this Inquiry and the entire journal in the Educators tab below. Topics: Active Forest Management, Cartograms, Forest Conservation, Forest Inventory, Forest Loss, Land Use.