
CIFOR-ICRAF at United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification COP15
Land restoration is crucial for resilience
Today, one third of the Earth’s surface area is degraded – negatively impacting the livelihoods of more than 3.2 billion people.
We have no time to waste. Land is the operative link between biodiversity loss and climate change.
By engaging in land restoration, we can help slow global warming, stem biodiversity loss, and reduce the risk, scale and frequency of natural disasters from floods to zoonotic diseases. What’s more, we can improve food security and drought resilience, as well as create sustainable green jobs.
Land restoration aims to reverse land degradation through a variety of activities that revitalize our soil, watersheds, and natural ecosystems. However, it is no longer enough to prevent further damage to the land; it is necessary to act decisively to reverse and recover what we have lost.
At COP15, scientists from the Center for International Forestry Research and World Agroforestry (CIFOR-ICRAF) will share their latest research on restoration, agroforestry, tree genetic resources, sustainable forest management, soil and land health, to inform policy and drive necessary change.
Highlights
Our speakers
10 May
High-level segment
Roundtable 3 – The Big Dry: From disaster to drought resilience
LOCATION
MET 18Drought puts livelihoods and ecosystems at risk, trapping vulnerable groups in a continuous cycle of poverty. At COP14 held in 2019, Parties to the Convention agreed to “mitigate, adapt to, and manage the effects of drought in order to enhance resilience of vulnerable populations and ecosystems” with a particular focus on ‘prevention’ and ‘preparedness’ via ‘green recovery’.
11 May
SIDE EVENT
High Level Breakfast: Grasslands, Savannahs and Rangelands Coalition for Food, People and Nature
LOCATION
MET-1854% of our global terrestrial land is made up of grasslands, savannahs and rangelands. These ecocystems provide a shared home for wildlife and people, support livelihoods and provide life giving services and benefits. However, they are undervalued and overlooked, subsequently they face some of the fastest and largest rates of land conversion and degradation, resulting in livelihood, habitat and biodiversity losses, carbon emissions, food and freshwater insecurity. This high level breakfast convenes stakeholders to build a coalition and alliances to advocate and take action for resilient and sustainable lands in grasslands, savannahs and rangelands for food, people and nature.
LOCATION
Rio Conventions Pavilion, MET-07Drought Day at UNCCD COP15 will be an occasion to present and discuss how to transform political commitments to action on drought resilience. Speakers showcase effective policies and projects on the ground from all regions around the world. Organized with the active engagement of partners, the Drought Day delivers a special call for action.
LOCATION
MET-2According to IUCN, almost 2 billion USD is required annually for the world to achieve its Land Degradation Neutrality Target, according to IUCN. Even though the Land Degradation Neutrality fund has started to address that financing gap, there is still a significant shortfall in addressing the acute need to restore degraded landscapes that can create resilient livelihoods for those vulnerable to the ill effects of desertification and climate change.
LOCATION
MET-2With two thirds of its land degraded, the Sahel is characterized by its significant social and ecological vulnerability to climate change in combination with an exponentially fast growing population. The Sahel is also home to the largest land restoration opportunity in Africa. The restoration of degraded landscapes across this region presents a unique opportunity to rebuild its soil, biodiversity, water quality and resilience while creating new jobs, industries, and fostering local livelihood.
LOCATION
Main Committee RoomMain side event
Conflict, COVID, Climate Change: Bouncing back from crisis through the Agriculture Breakthrough
LOCATION
MET-08At the UNFCCC COP26, 45 countries representing 70% of global GDP launched the Breakthrough Agenda and committed to work together this decade to accelerate the development and deployment of the clean technologies needed to meet the Paris Agreement goals, ensuring they are affordable and accessible for all.
12 May
Food Day at Rio Conventions Pavilion
High-level Opening Session: Importance of Food Systems Transformation to achieve Rio Conventions objectives
LOCATION
Rio Conventions Pavilion, MET-07The Rio Conventions—on Biodiversity, Climate Change and Desertification are intrinsically linked, operating in the same ecosystems and addressing interdependent issues. Land degradation, biodiversity loss and climate change are three different faces of the same central challenge: the increasingly dangerous impact of our choices on the health of our natural environment. These three threats cannot be tackled in isolation – they each deserve the highest policy priority and must be addressed together. Radical transformation of land use is necessary to combat the climate, nature and food crises.
Food Day at Rio Conventions Pavilion
Healthy Soil for a Healthy Planet: Building resilient food systems for increased food and nutrition security
LOCATION
Rio Conventions Pavilion, MET-07Healthy soil is the very foundation of our food system. Over 90 per cent of our food production depends on soil. Soil is also one of the Earth’s most important carbon sinks. Yet, it is estimated that over a third of the Earth’s surface is degraded, limiting the ability of the soil to deliver these vital ecosystem services and functions. To stop this trend, individuals, countries and companies alike must unite in their efforts to bring life back to degraded soils.
LOCATION
MET-13Session recording available
Widespread land degradation across Africa is combining with the impacts of the climate crisis to exacerbate poverty, instability, and insecurity.
For that reason, many efforts are ongoing to restore land health and enhance livelihoods. This session will review past restoration efforts, highlight recent lessons, and showcase successes from across the continent, and so help inform future investments and initiatives such as the Great Green Wall.
Food Day at Rio Conventions Pavilion
Food Systems Transformation: ways to strengthen implementation of the Rio Conventions
LOCATION
Rio Conventions Pavilion, MET-07A sustainable future requires us to halt and reverse biodiversity loss and limit climate change to no more than 1.5°C, while meeting the fundamental human right to healthy food for all. This depends on an equitable and nature-positive transformation of our food systems and requires a paradigm shift from maximising production at the expense of nature, to optimising production with the support of nature.
LOCATION
MET-11Land is soil, land is food, land is life. However, to achieve sustainable landscapes and land degradation neutrality, it is imperative that governments embody a rights based landscapes approach to securing a variety of rights, of which land rights are one. This event will offer a broader framing of landscape rights – “a bundle of rights” that include the right to water, livelihood, justice, spatial decision making, and land rights among others.
13 May
LOCATION
MET-12Session recording available
Healthy soil is the very foundation of our food systems and provides several vital ecosystem services, from carbon sequestration to improving food and nutrition security. Efforts to combat desertification, to move from scarcity to prosperity, will need to consider how to scale soil health, globally.
Africa Pavilion
Life-giving lands: a roadmap for land restoration and food security in the grasslands, rangelands, and savannahs
LOCATION
MET12-Africa PavilionEcosystems dominated by grasses, forbs and shrubs constitute our grasslands, savannahs and rangelands. Highly diverse landscapes, they support millions of livelihoods including for farmers and pastoralists. These landscapes cover 54% of global terrestrial land, provide a shared home for people and wildlife, and offer life giving services and benefits like biodiversity, food, freshwater, climate regulation and fibre.
LOCATION
Rio Conventions Pavilion, MET-07SIDE EVENT
Against all odds: The winding path from multidimensional fragility to drought resilience in drylands
LOCATION
MET11Around 2 billion people live in fragile conditions presently, which is likely to grow to half of the world’s poor by 2030. More than half the people seriously affected by natural disasters live in fragile states. The emerging consensus is that environmental factors and natural resource scarcity can be a driver of fragility, as ecosystems with limited coping capacities are less resilient to stresses and shocks.
14 May
Science Day at Rio Conventions Pavilion
Science for Action: Land Restoration and Drought
LOCATION
Rio Conventions Pavilion, MET-07Science Day at UNCCD COP15 brings scientists, policy makers, practitioners, academia, media and representatives of civil society organizations and development organizations under theme ‘Science for Action: Land Restoration and Drought’. Science Day is organized by the UNCCD Science-Policy Interface.
LOCATION
MET-14Major policy initiatives and strategies have been launched globally to address crises related to land including food and water insecurity, climate change, land degradation, biodiversity loss, COVID-19 and poverty. Due to weak coordination, it has been difficult to implement these into practical actions on the ground. these initiatives hait has been difficult to implement these on the ground due to weak coordination.
Side event
Integrated approaches for sustainable land management in sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia
LOCATION
MET-11Session recording available
The Resilient Food Systems programme through its integrated and multi-stakeholder frameworks engages smallholder farmer groups, private sector entities, governments and scientific institutions at national and regional levels to advancing an integrated and holistic approach to environmental management for food security. A total of $1billion is invested in 12 countries in sub-Sahara Africa through multi-partnership approach, including 10 million USD of GEF grant resources.