WRI’s Land & Carbon Lab harnesses the data revolution to monitor the pulse of the planet’s land and its nature-based carbon. We provide decision-makers everywhere with the information they need to address the global land squeeze – to combat climate change, protect biodiversity, and improve people’s…

Around the world, 26.7 million hectares of agricultural land have been transferred into the hands of foreign investors since the year 2000. This means that these investors possess approximately 2 per cent of the arable land worldwide, or roughly the equivalent to the total area covered by United…

While never offering a blueprint, FOLA shares a diversity of insights, experiences, and lessons from countries across the continent, highlighting the critical role of property rights in local livelihoods and development.

"When we talk to investors," explain Sofia Faruqi and Andrew Wu from WRI, "one of their first questions is, 'How do we make money in restoration?'" A new infographic reveals the financial opportunities, the major revenue streams from restored land.

One year following the adoption of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, 102 Parties to the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) have embarked on national processes to set voluntary targets to LDN, one of the targets under Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 15 (Protect, restore and…

This book reconciles competing and sometimes contradictory forms of land use, while also promoting sustainable land use options. It highlights land use planning, spatial planning, territorial (or regional) planning, and ecosystem-based or environmental land use planning as tools that strengthen land…

Monitoring SDG 15 in an EU context focuses on progress made in improving the status of ecosystems, in decelerating land degradation and in preserving biodiversity.

Soils have been the neglected environmental media for a long time. However, several food crises at the beginning of this century have brought a change in perspective of late. Since then, the indispensable value of soils for humans and for the conservation of the environment as a whole has been…

Hadjara Ali watched with displeasure as a tractor dug trenches through the parched earth in her remote Niger village, preparing ground for planting where grass has not grown in years. By using machines, women will no longer be obliged to do the back-breaking work left by men who leave their villages…

In recent decades, the various strands of the food movement have made enormous strides in calling attention the many shortcomings and injustices of our food and agricultural system. However, the movement for fairer, healthier, and more autonomous food is continually blocked by one obstacle: land…

Since the invention of agriculture 8,000–10,000 years ago, growing crops and raising livestock have been the primary causes of ecosystem loss and degradation. Today agriculture remains the dominant driver of tropical deforestation and associated impacts on biodiversity. Agricultural land makes up…

Increasing global demand for natural resources is intensifying competition for land across the developing world, pushing companies onto territories that many Indigenous Peoples and rural communities have sustainably managed for generations. These communities, who collectively hold at least half the…

The number of documented international land investments (aka land-grabbing) has been on the rise since 2000. Investors, whether private or governmental, are particularly interested in large-scale tracts of land located in the less-developed countries of the Global South. Inevitably, such investments…

This working paper analyzes the role of land use and spatial planning tools, processes and approaches to improve socio-economic opportunities through sustainable management of land resources (i.e., soil, water, and biodiversity). Section 1 explores the nexus between land use planning and changes in…