Currently 22% of policies include monitoring strategies. Without legal requirement to monitor, restoration is often considered successful—irrespective of its results. Given that adaptive management relies on continuous assessment, better monitoring mechanisms would enhance effectiveness and should be included in legal devices. Agroforestry appears in 7% of policies, in spite of their potential for reconciling agricultural production with biodiversity conservation and ecosystem service provision. Therefore, using indigenous mixed-species plantations should also be encouraged in public policies that consider agroforestry systems. Restoration success depends on enforcement, community involvement, as well as socioeconomic and cultural factors. Consequently, better conditions for human development may increase forest cover by restoration. Policies must integrate local contexts for effectiveness, while considering climate adaptation strategies.

Higher planting densities can initially enhance stand yield and carbon sequestration while improving stem quality by limiting branchiness, but for longer-rotation plantations focused on timber quality, thinning is recommended. As plantations age, reduced individual-tree growth and quality, along with higher mortality, may require density reductions to meet management goals. Without better information, intermediate planting densities may help balance growth and stem quality without restricting individual performance. The strong demand for practical knowledge in Europe highlights the need for more local evidence, particularly on alternative performance indicators like physiological traits, tree health, and a range of biomass compartments.

This study provides several ways restoration practitioners can move forward with determining how to restore ecotonal species. Given the steep gradients in ecotones, we recommend conducting surveys of distributional limits of wild populations to first understand species tolerance limits. Restoration experiments manipulating physical conditions or neighbors can help determine what factors allow an ecotonal species to extend into stressful conditions. Facilitation may prove more effective than soil amendment at ameliorating stressful physical conditions at the edge of the physical tolerance limit of ecotonal species. Restoration of these species is possible with knowledge of their elevational distributions and the factors limiting their expansion.