Planted forests are seen as a means to meet increasing demand for timber and environmental services and thus to achieve sustainable forest development. In this paper, we use the Faustmann–Hartman silvicultural investment model to demonstrate how policy instruments influence planted forest development and review such a development in China, the U.S., Brazil, and France. We find that planted forests emerge because of scarcity in timber and environmental services and develop in response to economic and policy and institutional instruments, including secure property rights, stumpage price policy, and efficient forestry governance and administration.