World Day to Combat Desertification 2016.This year, the world comes together to celebrate this day under the theme of “Protect Earth. Restore land. Engage people”.
Desertification, land degradation, drought and climate change are interconnected. As a result of land degradation and climate change, the severity and frequency of droughts have been increasing, along with floods and extreme temperatures. More than 50 per cent of agricultural land is moderately or severely degraded, with 12 million hectares lost to production each year.
Every June 17th, the global community celebrates World Day to Combat desertification (WDCD). In his annual message to mark the day, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon urged all actors to work together. “Without a long-term solution, desertification and land degradation will not only affect food supply but lead to increased migration and threaten the stability of many nations and regions. This is why world leaders made land degradation neutrality one of the targets of the Sustainable Development Goals. That means rehabilitating at least 12 million hectares of degraded land a year,” he said. Last year, 193 countries pledged to strive to become land degradation neutral by 2030. This means that if one hectare of land is degraded, we should try to restore back to health an equal amount of degraded land.
“Ninety countries have already signed up to the challenge and are setting their national targets. This is admirable. But it is not enough when at least 169 countries are affected by land degradation or drought, and all countries are indirectly impacted by them,” said UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) Executive Secretary Monique Barbut.“Actions to avoid, halt and reverse land degradation must begin now with everyone fully engaged. The prospect of a land degradation neutral world grows dimmer if we procrastinate. But it shines brighter each time a person or country joins the campaign to restore degraded land or the battle against the degradation of new land.”
Addressing the UNCCD COP12 in Ankara, Turkey, last year, the GEF CEO Naoko Ishii announced a contribution of USD 3 million for countries to support their target setting under the Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) concept. Using set-aside resources of the 6th replenishment allocations for the Land Degradation Focal Area (LDFA), this enabling activity should enhance capacity of recipient countries to speed up target setting in line with the Sustainable Development Goals.
Read the original post at the GEF website.
