This issue of Unasylva underlines the importance of forests as crucial, cost-effective natural infrastructure for the production of high-quality water, including for urban supplies, and points out that their management for water will become increasingly important in the face of climate change.

It calls for a transformation from conventional forest management approaches to nature-based solutions that make water-related ecosystem services the primary objective. It also highlights the way in which trees and forests multiply the oceanic supply of freshwater through moisture recycling. It stresses the need to halt deforestation, and offers a way to increase water-related benefits of forest restoration through a water-centred approach for maintaining the resilience of forested drylands.

The journal also explores the crucial role of peatlands in climate change and water security, and the need to make them a focus of policy and research. It further examines the changing role of fire in forest landscapes and the need for strategic forest management to safeguard urban water supplies, as well as the need for more research and coordination to inform decisions on the role of mangroves in disaster risk reduction.