Works well in some ecosystems when people choose the right plant material. With the wrong ecosystem and the wrong plant material it's one of those ideas from the temperate core that fails in the tropical periphery.
The Orchard of Flavours experimented successfully with the Miyawaki method in their botanical garden located in Algarve, Portugal, with a Koppen climate classified as temperate but with hot and dry summer periods, see https://www.orchardofflavours.com/miyawaki-experiment-1-wild.... They grow plenty of tropical trees like feijoa, guava, papaya, etc.
At which scale are you looking at? We have used Miyawaki to create a microclimate around our house, perhaps 120m^2, in a tier-3 town in Andhra. I have heard someone saying the minimum is around 10m2, in order to have room for proper diversity.
From the examples, it looks like the age-old distinction between process and results: do you want to/get rewarded for having a forest after some years, or do you just want to plant some trees as cheaply as possible to tick a box?
Getting good results costs more because it requires caring about what you're doing and putting in extra effort to ensure success.
I mean, you have major tree planting happening every summer in Canada, and it's all around trying to mono-culture the entire country for the sake of timber companies. They immediately spray Glyphosate on areas burnt by forest fires, so that low value fire break species like Alder don't establish themselves in the area and then they can send in tree planters to plant higher value pine, which is a serotinous species, ie: promotes fire. Then they blame all the bush fires on Climate change.
Separate from the forestry philosophy in the headlines article, Japan also famously made a decision in the 1960s that resulted in monoculturing the country into seasonal allergies for the timber industry: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hay_fever_in_Japan
Forest planting for commercial forestry is not the same as forest planting for urban improvement. The goals and means are different.
Climate change and forestry practices can both take blame for the fire cycles. Commercial foresters have been following these practices for generations and it only started becoming a major issue as climate conditions changed... Practices must adapt, but nobody likes change.
The Yale article says forest scientists warn that "failed afforestation projects around the world threaten to undermine efforts to make [tree] planting a credible means of countering climate change by reducing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere or generating carbon credits for sale to companies to offset their emissions."
I think it's less that Japan is famous for its climate zones and more that it's a safe, comfortable topic of conversation that Japanese people use - the whole "Did you know Japan has four seasons?" question that every foreigner hears. It's generally considered polite to respond with surprised interest rather than "yeah, so does most of the temperate part of the world."
