Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) is a paradigm shift in land management policies and practices. It is a unique approach that counterbalances the expected loss of productive land with the recovery of degraded areas. It strategically places the measures to conserve, sustainably manage and restore…

Former SPI members Elena María Abraham (member from 2014 – 2017) Elena María Abraham is a Scientific Researcher of the National Council of Scientific and Technical Research (CONICET), Director of the Argentine Institute for Research on Arid Lands (IADIZA) and Professor of Environmental Planning and…

The Soil Leadership Academy (SLA) is a special initiative of the UNCCD. It is an innovative, public-private partnership. It aims to energize and support public and private decision-makers on their journey to land degradation neutrality (LDN). Many organizations already offer the resources and…

An agreement between The United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) and The World Overview of Conservation Approaches and Technologies (WOCAT) was signed on 15 April 2014. In the agreement WOCAT was identified as primary recommended database for best practices on SLM technologies.

The following tools and resources were presented in the publication “Scientific Conceptual Framework for Land Degradation Neutrality: A Report of the Science-Policy Interface” as examples of sources of information that countries pursuing land degradation neutrality (LDN) could use. The list is not…

Drought-smart land management characterizes land-based interventions for drought mitigation. Such D-SLM interventions improve the capacity of soil to accept, retain, release and transmit water and increase plant water use efficiency. They can do so broadly by increasing the water supply where it is…

SPI Members Pablo Aurelio Pablo Viegas Aurelio is technical advisor for the Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development of Argentina. He graduated in law and postgraduate in business and agribusiness law of the University of Buenos Aires (UBA). Since 2001 he has been working on the subject…

Rapid urbanization is taking place all over the world, driven largely by rural migration, resulting in urban sprawl and slum developments as well as in the development of high quality infrastructure and overall improvement in the standard of living. If current projections are accurate, 66 per cent…

The World Overview of Conservation Approaches and Technologies (WOCAT) is a network of Sustainable Land Management (SLM) specialists from all over the world. Currently, there are more than 2000 registered users, over 60 participating institutions, and roughly 30 national and regional initiatives…

Land degradation neutrality (LDN) means that the amount and quality of land resources necessary to support ecosystem functions and services and enhance food security remain stable or increase within specified temporal and spatial scales and ecosystems. LDN contributes to multiple sustainable…

Definition Croplands are lands that are used for the cultivation of crops (WOCAT, 2016). According to the IPCC 2006 Guidelines for National Greenhouse Gas Inventories, this can include “all annual and perennial crops as well as temporary fallow land (i.e., land set at rest for one or several years…

Publications and articles from the UNCCD Sustainable Land Management Contribution to Land-based Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation: The report provides scientifically sound practical guidance for selecting SLM practices that help address desertification, land degradation, and drought (DLDD)…

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), officially known as “Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development”, are an intergovernmental set of 17 aspiration Goals with 169 targets. The Goals are contained in paragraph 54 United Nations Resolution A/RES/70/1 of 25 September 2015…

A total of 316 participants from 140 country Parties to the Convention were trained in March-May 2018 during five regional training workshops implemented by the UNCCD secretariat, the Global Mechanism and UN Environment, and funded by the Global Environment Facility. Participants were trained, among…

The UNCCD secretariat maintains a Roster of Independent Experts (RoE), based on nominations by Country Parties. The RoE’s purpose is to facilitate access to information and expertise in a variety of fields related to the work of the Convention. Further, Parties to the Convention are invited to…

Introducing the IPCC Special Report on Climate Change and Land Facilitator: Mariam Akhtar-Schuster Opening remarks: Mariam Akhtar-Schuster and Annette Cowie Introduction to the report: Jim Skea (Co-Chair, Working Group III), Minal Pathak (Technical Support Unit Working Group III, Drafting Author…

The concept of land is fundamental and deeply held within every human culture. Land is our life-support system. It is not just real estate. It embraces the air above and its climate; the natural vegetation and wildlife; managed crops, forest, range, and livestock; surface- and groundwater; the…

Land provides vital environmental functions and ecosystem services, including provisioning and regulating services. It is also inextricably linked to human well-being and plays a role in food security and livelihoods. When land resources are over-exploited and degraded, quality of life is negatively…

Agriculture is the single biggest land use covering more than one-third of the world’s land surface, not including Greenland and Antarctica. The amount and quality of land available for food production is under pressure from the decisions and demands made by consumers, producers, and governments…

There has been a massive and unprecedented explosion in energy use since the 19th century; global energy use has grown by more than 20 times in the last 200 years, far outstripping the rate of population growth (Grübler, 2004). In particular, the use of fossil fuels has increased dramatically…

“ Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world” Nelson Mandela It is no secret: The way we live is not sustainable. Our planet is facing multiple interconnected crises caused by human behaviour. We are depleting the planet’s resources. Climate change is affecting us…

The goal of the Great Green Wall initiative is to strengthen the resilience of natural systems in the Sahel and Sahara regions through sound ecosystem management, sustainable development of land resources, as well as protection of rural heritage and improvement of living conditions of local…

The Global Land Outlook (GLO) is a strategic communications platform and publication that demonstrates the central importance of land quality to human well-being, assesses current trends in land conversion, degradation and loss, identifies the driving factors and analyzes the impacts, provides…

Given growing demands on land and emerging challenges from land degradation and climate change, policymakers require information on the possible consequences. This chapter explores trends up to 2050, through the Shared Socio-economic Pathways scenarios, based on the report ‘Exploring the impact of…

Principles are provided to govern application of the framework and to help prevent unintended outcomes during implementation and monitoring of Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN). To achieve the broader development objectives of the UNCCD and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), LDN interventions…