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317. "World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought" and Sustainable Land Management

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June 17 is the World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought, which was established in 1995 following the adoption of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) on June 17, 1994, with the main objective of preventing desertification and saving people from drought.

Desertification is, in most cases, not the expansion of existing deserts but decrease of productivity in cropland, forest, or grassland caused by land degradation in drylands. More than 25 years have passed since the conclusion of the UNCCD, but desertification has not stopped and has even accelerated due to human activities. Desertification exacerbates poverty, food problems, and biodiversity loss, and land degradation also makes it more vulnerable to drought. The United Nations General Assembly declared the United Nations Decade for Deserts and the Fight Against Desertification (2010- 2020) to address the accelerated desertification. The UNCCD summarized the achievements as follows:

  • Awareness raising
  • Expanded science and knowledge base. For example, the development of three indicators for monitoring Land Degradation Neutrality: land cover, the productivity of the land and the amount of carbon in the soil.
  • Policies to guide action. For example, governments made positive progress in improving women’s and smallholder farmers’ land tenure and access to resources which are often major constraints to technology adoption.

In order to achieve Target 15.3 “End desertification and restore degraded land” of SDG 15 (Life on Land), the UNCCD has set the following goals in its new Strategic Framework for 2018-2030:
1. To improve the condition of affected ecosystems, combat desertification/land degradation, promote sustainable land management and contribute to land degradation neutrality
2. To improve the living conditions of affected populations
3. To mitigate, adapt to, and manage the effects of drought in order to enhance resilience of vulnerable populations and ecosystems

JIRCAS has developed, as a sustainable land management practice, the “Fallow Band System” which can both control soil erosion, a major cause of land degradation, and increase soil productivity in West Africa, as well as a shallow subsurface drainage system which can control soil salinization in Uzbekistan. In addition, we have also developed a pastoral management system to reduce risks of extreme weather in Mongolia.

In the “Sustainable land management in drylands” project, which started in April 2021, we are pursuing the development of a scheme to promote soil conservation in Burkina Faso in West Africa and northern India in relation to the UNCCD strategic goals 1 and 3. The development of drought-resistant soil and crop management technologies is underway.

Lastly, on the UNCCD website, there is a “Message from Mr. Land Soil” and an animated film “Let's Talk about Soil” that tells the reality of soil resources around the world. Please take a look.

References

Ikazaki et al. (2011) https://doi.org/10.1080/00380768.2011.593155
Okuda et al. (2020) https://doi.org/10.3390/w12113207
Oniki et al. (2018) https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rama.2018.02.003

Contributor: IKAZAKI Kenta (Crop, Livestock and Environment Division)
 

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