Over 2.5 million hectare of forest landscape will be restored by countries in the Caucasus and Central Asia under the Bonn Challenge by 2030. The commitment was made by Armenia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan at the first Ministerial Roundtable on Forest Landscape Restoration and the Bonn Challenge in the Caucasus and Central Asia, held on 21-22 June 2018 in Astana, Kazakhstan. The meeting also adopted the Astana Resolution, committing the region to go beyond 2.5 million ha, and strengthen partnerships and regional cooperation to this end.

Ministers and country representatives used the opportunity to align national and regional restoration and planting efforts with the international Bonn Challenge – a global effort to bring 350 million ha of degraded and deforested land into restoration by 2030. The Government of Germany and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) launched the Bonn Challenge in 2011.