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Good practice Imported

Bogotá's 5x1 Rule — Five Trees Planted for Every One Felled for Construction

Colombia · Bogotá · See the Colombia profile · See the Bogotá profile

Evidence: Descriptive / self-reported Top 76% 33/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

Since 2022, Bogotá requires developers who fell an urban tree to plant five in return, or pay a monetary equivalent, under a formula weighing epiphytes, wildlife habitat and tree-poor areas, replacing a weaker 2x1 rule, targeting 802,000 new trees.

802,000
Citywide new-tree target
>200,000
Plants maintained across municipal nurseries
1,378
Hectares identified for new planting
5:1
Compensation ratio
Bogotá's 5x1 Rule — Five Trees Planted for Every One Felled for Construction

Details

Maturity
Scaling
Promoter
Secretaría Distrital de Ambiente de Bogotá (SDA)
Period
2021–present
Keywords
urban forestry, tree compensation, construction permitting, biodiversity habitat criteria

Context

Bogotá's Secretaría Distrital de Ambiente (SDA) regulates felling of urban trees for construction; the prior ~2-for-1 replacement ratio (2011) was seen as too weak to offset urban tree loss.

Activities

Resolución SDA 3158 de 2021, effective 1 January 2022, requires five trees planted — or an equivalent mix of larger-specimen planting, hardscape conversion or monetary payment — for every tree removed, with compensation value weighted by tree height, diameter, conservation status, epiphytes, habitat value and scarcity of trees in the neighbourhood.

Results

The city reports maintaining more than 200,000 plants across three municipal nurseries and 1,378 hectares identified for new planting, against a citywide target of 802,000 new trees.

Conclusions

A legal analysis from Universidad Externado cautions that practitioners have historically defaulted to the lowest-friction compensation option (monetary payment) over replanting when planting sites are scarce, and flags the three-year mandatory maintenance period as a potential disincentive to full compliance.

Implementation
Indicative cost
Medium (€50k–€500k)
Time to results
Long (> 3 years)
Staffing & skills
Secretaría Distrital de Ambiente (SDA) compliance officers, Municipal nursery staff (3 nurseries), Developers/construction permit holders

Conditions for success

  • Compensation value formula weighted by tree characteristics and neighbourhood tree scarcity to target replanting where it's needed most
  • Three-year mandatory maintenance period for newly planted trees

Common failure modes

  • Universidad Externado analysis finds practitioners often default to monetary payment over physical replanting when sites are scarce, working against the resolution's own stated hierarchy

Commonly funded by

Own resources / municipal budget

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Data sources

Where this practice's information was retrieved from, and when.

Attachments

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