Merkel promises €500m to revitalise German forests

Storms, drought, beetles and fires have destroyed equivalent of 250,000 football fields

Angela Merkel's government has promised more than half a billion euros to revitalise the country's crisis-hit forests in the fight against climate change.

A third of Germany's landmass is covered in woodland, and forests play an important role in the country's national folklore, from the fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm to the poems of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.