Changwon City, Republic of Korea, 18 October 2011 – They are marginal and marginalized. There are one billion of them and they struggle to subsist in the world's drylands. They are the poor the world forgot. Initially unveiled for consultation last year, the UNCCD/UNDP report, "The Forgotten Billion…

​Award announced to recognise significant and innovative contributions to reversing land desertification, land degradation and droughtChangwon, Republic of Korea, 19 October 2011 – Seeking to promote efforts for sustainable land management, the Land for Life Award was launched at the tenth session…

Changwon City, Republic of Korea, 22 October 2011 – "This session will be remembered as the session that has brought a lot of innovation both in the actions proposed and the way parties interact among themselves. We have brought together the pieces that will enable the engine called science to move…

Rewarding leadership for sustainable land management Bonn, Germany, 9 February 2012 – Applications for the 2012 Land for Life Award are now open. The award will go to inspiring initiatives which secure the health and productivity of soil for the well-being of present and future generations. The…

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 13 June 2012 – At the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20), the secretariats of the biodiversity, climate change and desertification conventions and the Global Environment Facility are joining forces under the Rio Conventions Pavilion to promote…

Doha, Qatar, 4 December 2012 – Three civil society organizations, Sustainable Organic Integrated Livelihoods (SOIL) from Haiti, Conservation Efforts for Community Development (CECOD) from Uganda and the Turkish Foundation for Combating Soil Erosion (TEMA) of Turkey took home international…

Geneva, Switzerland, 15 March 2013 – A top-level United Nations conference has, for the first time, laid the foundations for practical and proactive national drought policies to increase resilience to the world’s most destructive natural hazard, which is being aggravated by climate change. The High…

Bonn, Germany, 9 January 2014 – Tarja Halonen, former President of Finland, has accepted her designation as Drylands Ambassador of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) for at least two years, to promote the shift towards sustainable land management practices globally and better…

How can the UNCCD Parties and other stakeholders build on their achievements on empowering women to make an even stronger impact? In the eve of the 15th session of the Committee for the Review of the Implementation of the Convention (CRIC15), the members of the civil society organizations exchanged…

Fresh water is a vital and defining feature for sustainable development. Globally, over two billion people live in countries that experience high water stress (UN-Water 2019 from UN, 2018). Other estimates are even more pessimistic, with up to four billion people – over half the population of the…

The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development puts a strong emphasis on the integrated approach to achieving SDGs that can harness synergies and minimize potential trade-offs. Land can play an important part in accelerating the achievement of many SDGs. Maintaining and restoring land resources can…

This page presents the original submissions by outside authors and contributors on events and activities around the world that promote action against desertification, land degradation and mitigation of drought. Your contributions are welcome (see contribution guidelines on the right). Information…

2 billion hectares of productive land are degraded worldwide while a further 12 million hectares are degraded every year. This has severe consequences for the livelihoods of land users, both at social and environmental levels. Stopping land degradation is critical in mitigating climate change: soil…

Of the Convention’s 197 Parties, 169 countries have declared that they are affected by desertification. More than 1.5 billion people directly depend on land that is slowly being degraded. Every year 75 billion tons of fertile soil is lost to land degradation. Similarly 12 million hectares of land…

Poor rural women in developing countries are critical to the survival of their families. Fertile land is their lifeline. But the number of people negatively affected by land degradation is growing rapidly. Crop failures, water scarcity and the migration of traditional crops are damaging rural…

International Women’s Day this year focuses on economic empowerment in the changing world of work. The vision is to achieve gender equality and empowerment of women and girls by 2030. Girls’ aged three will become adults with a legal right to work in 2030. Together, with those aged up to 10, these…

The Mali singer and actress, Fatoumata Diawara visited the UNCCD Executive Secretary Monique Barbut at the UNCCD headquarters on 22 March. Fatoumata came to Bonn, Germany, to perform at the opening of the “Over the Border Music Diversity Festival”. Fatoumata is also known as a strong advocator for…

Through the Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) Target Setting Programme, the Global Mechanism (GM) and the secretariat of the UNCCD, in collaboration with multiple international partners, are supporting interested countries with their national LDN target setting process, including setting national…

This Earth Day, we invite you to take your children outside, into nature, to strengthen their connection with the environment. It is the best way to motivate them to protect it. The effects of climate change are not always obvious to us. Yet, they are undeniable. It is easier to see the harmful…

The Permanent Missions of Qatar, Iceland and Namibia, in conjunction with the office of the President of the General Assembly, organized a High-Level Event on Land Degradation, Desertification and Drought at United Nations headquarters on Monday, 1 May 2017. The event underlined the role of Land…

Women's Empowerment for a Land Degradation Neutral World The UNCCD COP12 Gender Day focused on three dimensions of policy action to ensure women are agents of positive change and that they are able to eradicate poverty and become resilient to climate change. These dimensions are land rights…

Climate change, biological diversity, desertification, land degradation and drought are intricately related on the social, economic and environmental fronts. Because these issues are closely linked, the secretariats of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the…

Globally and regionally renowned personalities have long played an effective advocacy and awareness raising role in sustainable development issues. In today’s social media dominated discourse, their ability to connect with their millions of fans using TikTok, Instagram or Twitter is immediate…

Representatives of governments, international organizations, businesses and media from different regions, cultures and age groups attended the Dialogue on Land and Security in Caux, France from 11 – 15 July 2017. The Dialogue recognized that the restoration of degraded lands is not only a key…