We prove existence of flips, special termination, the base point free theorem and, in the case of log general type, the existence of minimal models for F-dlt foliated pairs of co-rank one on a $${\mathbb {Q}}$$ Q -factorial projective threefold. As applications, we show the existence of F-dlt modifications and F-terminalisations for foliated pairs and we show that foliations with canonical or F-dlt singularities admit non-dicritical singularities. Finally, we show abundance in the case of numerically trivial foliated pairs.

We develop some foundational results in a higher dimensional foliated Mori theory, and show how these results can be used to prove a structure theorem for the Kleiman-Mori cone of curves in terms of the numerical properties of K F for rank 2 foliations on threefolds. We also make progress toward realizing a minimal model program (MMP) for rank 2 foliations on threefolds.

We prove existence of flips, special termination, the base point free theorem and, in the case of log general type, the existence of minimal models for F-dlt foliated log pairs of co-rank one on a projective threefold.As applications, we show the existence of F-dlt modifications and F-terminalisations for foliated log pairs and we show that foliations with canonical or F-dlt singularities admit non-dicritical singularities. Finally, we show abundance in the case of numerically trivial foliated log pairs.

We present a variant of the classical Darboux-Jouanolou Theorem. Our main result provides a characterization of foliations which are pull-backs of foliations on surfaces by rational maps. As an application, we provide a structure theorem for foliations on 3-folds admitting an infinite number of extremal rays. Mathematics Subject Classification 37F75 • 14E30 1.1 Statement of the main result Rational pull-backs of foliations on projective surfaces provide natural examples with infinitely many quasi-invariant divisors. Our main result shows that the existence of sufficiently many quasi-invariant hypersurfaces characterizes this class of foliations.

We provide several applications of the minimal model program to the local and global study of co-rank 1 foliations on threefolds. Locally, we prove a singular variant of Malgrange's theorem, a classification of terminal foliation singularities and the existence of separatrices for log canonical singularities. Globally, we prove termination of flips, a connectedness theorem on log canonical centres, a non-vanishing theorem and some hyperbolicity properties of foliations.