Carbon sink

This is the fashionable term given to forests because of their major role in the planetary recycling of carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen.  Through photosynthesis plants will combine carbon dioxide and water to produce sugars needed for growth.  They are therefore critical in the absorption of the rising levels of carbon dioxide which lead to the 'greenhouse effect'.  Eucalyptus plantations can produce as much as ten times as much sustainable harvest as can native virgin forest and consequently absorb much higher amounts of carbon dioxide.