Forest coverage refers to the percentage of the forest area in the land area of a country or region. It is an indicator to reflect the forest area occupation, the abundance of forest resources and the degree of greening in a country or region. It is also an important basis for determining the policy of forest management, development, and utilization.

The continent with the most forests is Latin America, accounting for 24% of the world's forest area, with a forest coverage rate of 44%. The country with the highest rate of forest coverage is Suriname in South America, reaching 94.6%. The country with the lowest forest cover rate is in the Middle East and North Africa, only one in 100000. The country with the fastest growth of forest coverage is France.

South America has 21% of the world's forests and 45% of the world's tropical forests. Brazil alone accounts for 30% of the world's tropical forests. The annual loss of forests in this country is as high as 3.2 million hectares. According to the FAO report, Brazil produced 103 million cubic meters of logs in 2000 alone.

The current situation of a country's forest coverage is not necessarily related to the intensity of deforestation in that country. Because the natural forest coverage of each country is different, because the natural vegetation itself is diverse. Countries such as Indonesia and Japan, whose natural vegetation is dominated by forests, may have higher forest coverage than those that do not have much deforestation, but whose natural vegetation is not dominated by forests.

It is meaningless to look at the forest coverage of a country. It depends on the change of forest coverage. However, even if the forest coverage rate changes, it can only explain certain problems, because it cannot show the change of forest quality. If the forest coverage rate does not change much, but the forest quality decreases, it still shows that there is certain damage.