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A full account for carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) and other greenhouse gas balance is presented for the Dutch forest and nature areas for 1990-2002 at a Tier 2.5 level. The paper outlines how complex guidelines can be turned into a practical system, appropriate for a small country, making use of the best knowledge and data available. The net total sink of all processes of the forest and other nature terrains balance is very stable through time around an average of 1.74 million tonnes of CO 2 per year. The sink is to a large extent determined by the growth of forest remaining forest, and the harvest taking place in there. Newly added processes in this new National System are significant as well, but they compensate each other. The sources from deforestation and nitrous oxide (N 2 O) emissions (around 900 ktonne CO 2 ) are for two thirds compensated by the sinks from afforestation, dead wood, soil C changes due to land use changes, and trees outside the forest. The land use changes between 1990 and 2000 showed that The Netherlands has an annual deforestation of 2504 ha (0.7% of the forest area) and an afforestation of 3124 ha. Deforestation led in total over the 13 years of 1990-2002 to an emission of 11.2 million tonne CO 2 compensated by only 1.9 million tonne CO 2 due to afforestation.

A high resolution, inventory-based carbon (C) balance assessment for European forests for the period 2000-2030 was developed to reduce the high discrepancy in results found between inversion modelling (combined with biogeochemical modelling) and ground-based (forest inventory) modelling exercises. Preliminary results are provided showing the temporal evolution of the C balance (forest biomass, soils and products) in Norway over the period 2000-2020, and the spatial distribution of C balance per plot in France and in the Netherlands in 2000.

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