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As rich in culture, music and inspired people as the Sahel itself, the UNCCD event at Expo Dubai 2020 “Spotlight on Africa | Spotlighting the Sahel: Climate-Resilient Solutions towards achieving Food Security” marked a big step toward changing the world’s perception of the region. Rather than an area hindered by civil unrest and economic turmoil, the positive narrative of the Sahel’s showcases its potential: the abundance of natural resources, infinite deposits of renewable energy and the youngest population in the world. Along with a strong momentum for positive change, Sahel faces major development challenges, including the pressing need to adapt to changing climate and create opportunities for the new generation. In his opening remarks, the UNCCD Executive Secretary Ibrahim Thiaw highlighted that the potential of the Sahel to overcome these hurdles lies in the abundant resources including vast landscapes waiting to be restored to productivity. Sahel’s natural endowments offer immense potential for economic diversification, value-chain development and livelihoods. And its population is the youngest in the world – a challenge that can be turned into an opportunity. — UNCCD Executive Secretary Ibrahim Thiaw The event at Dubai Expo placed youth, women and smallholder farmers, herders and social entrepreneurs at the center of the conversation on the challenges and opportunities facing the Sahel. It featured initiatives that are accelerating socio-economic growth and enabling shared prosperity in the Sahel, such as Great Green Wall, to find solutions to address food security and climate change in the Sahel, including in implementing the Agenda 2030. Reflecting on the progress of the Great Green Wall Initiative, the participants agreed that it has far surpassed its initial vision of planting trees, becoming a platform that translates positive thinking into actions. The restoration of 20 million hectares of land in the Sahel, creation of 350,000 jobs, training of 10 million people on sustainable ways to manage the land and water and subsequent mobilization of nearly 20 billion hectares to move forward has inspired action at the local level. Harnessing indigenous knowledge and creating diversified value chains have been emphasized as essential to supporting the future progress of the initiative. The event showcased successful green entrepreneurs, many of them young women, who are convinced that in the Sahel, all the opportunities the youth needs exist at home. From agroforestry to producing eco-friendly coffee alternatives, the Sahel is awaiting young hands to revive the land, mine its “green gold,” drive climate action and achieve zero hunger. Performances of Sahelian visual and music artists, including the Malian singer and UNCCD Land Ambassador Inna Modja, have also made the event very memorable. Inna shared what motivated her to travel along the Great Green Wall and meet with communities engaged in land restoration: “I am awed by the ambition of the project and what it can achieve. The Great Green Wall is the future. We sow the seeds in this lifetime, so that the future generations can reap the harvest.” The event was co-organized by UNCCD and the African Union in association with the United Arab Emirates Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change. Learn more: Watch the recording Land and the Sustainable Development Goals Achieving Land Degradation Neutrality Great Green Wall Accelerator

Learning from Brazil’s innovative model to reverse desertification in Caatinga Brazil’s vast rainforest, rich in biodiversity, has captured the imagination of people around the world and attracted large-scale financing from donors committed to preserving this unique ecosystem. But what about the other, lesser-known or naturally endowed biomes?  The Caatinga drylands occupy 11 percent of the country, an area about 100 million hectares in the northeast of Brazil. It is home to over 34 million people. Preserving the unique resources in this region is vital because drylands are highly susceptible to land degradation. In 2016, Brazil established the Recovery Units of Degraded Areas and Reduction of Climate Vulnerability (URAD) initiative to address the main drivers of land degradation in the Caatinga. The project, which in the long run will be financed from the moneys generated by domestic environmental fines, received a start-up funding of USD$1 million from Brazil’s Climate Fund and US$9 million from the international community. Under the program, a recovery area is defined by its watershed. The local communities are mobilized to restore their watershed. They get support in the form of resources and training needed. The start-up cost per family for carrying out a watershed recovery is estimated at US$ 8,000. About 30 to 40 families take part in each project. The first activities aim to produce highly tangible results, such as restoring a water source. Direct results are they key to keeping the enthusiasm among community members going and to motivating them to take further actions. The first URAD community-level interventions were completed in half the estimated time. In turn, local people started to have confidence in government projects. The interest to get involved and enthusiasm in the projects grew and spread throughout other communities. But the watershed recovery project is rooted in more than providing direct benefits to communities. The participation of local communities is a guiding principle. Studies show that environmental actions that reduce the population's climate vulnerability are more likely to succeed when they involve local communities in decision-making to create sustainable value chains, generate employment and improve the quality of life. The URAD watershed recovery initiative is also founded and fully integrated in a sustainability model. The environmental, social and economic interventions are taken seriously with specific results targeted. For URAD, environmental actions aim to conserve soil, recover spring water, preserve biodiversity and improve the conditions for food production. Social actions focus on meeting the water, energy and sanitary security of the communities. Beekeeping and integrated crop-livestock-forest systems are examples of the sustainable activities being encouraged to meet livelihood needs – the economic side. The project is also designed to generate short-, medium and long-term needs. This is essential in project planning because political leaders, who are the main decision-makers, often mostly care about and invest depending on the short-term political gains or losses of what they do. Communities, on the other hand, are more willing to invest in actions that change their lives for the long haul. URAD’s short term goals were to recover water sources, contain soil erosion, reduce land degradation, mitigate the effects of drought and cut down soil and water pollution. In the medium-term, the productive capacity of the soil would recover, and help Brazil to fulfil its commitment to achieve land degradation neutrality. The conservation of the Caatinga is expected to improve the quality of life for the local people year by year, and reduce forced migration to urban areas. In the long-term term, the communities and their lands, plants, animals and natural resources are expected to adapt or become resilient to climate-change and it’s impacts. Brazil invests in the drylands because the URAD strategy has the potential to transform the reality for thousands of rural communities. With community-owned successes at the core of each intervention, the new model to reverse desertification has every chance to succeed. Learn More: Brazil sets up a novel model to reverse desertification

The LDN Fund is an impact investment fund blending resources from the public, private and philanthropic sectors to support achieving LDN through sustainable land management and land restoration projects implemented by the private sector. GM spearheaded the establishment of the LDN Fund and undertook its initial design with support from the Governments of France, Luxembourg, Norway, and the Rockefeller Foundation and involvement of an advisory group that brought together representatives from public financial institutions, international NGOs and academia. A private sector investment management firm Mirova, an affiliate of Natixis Investment Managers dedicated to responsible investing, was selected competitively to manage the LDN Fund. Officially launched at UNCCD COP 13 in Ordos, China, the LDN Fund is the first-of-its-kind investment vehicle leveraging public money to raise private capital for sustainable land projects.  Anchor investors – the European Investment Bank and the French Development Agency – are joined by institutional investors including the first north-American private investor Fondaction, the Fondation de France foundation and insurance companies BNP Paribas Cardif and Garance. The initiative is also backed by de-risking partners that include the Government of Luxembourg, IDB Invest and the Global Environment Facility. In total, investors have announced commitments of over USD 100 million out of a target of USD 300 million.

After a year of hard work, the UNCCD Performance Review and Implementation System (PRAIS) has undergone a major upgrade –from the 3rd (PRAIS 3) to 4th edition (PRAIS 4).

Two new guidance documents have been released today: a revised and upgraded version of Good Practice Guidance for Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) indicator 15.3.1 and new Good Practice Guidance for national reporting on UNCCD strategic objective 3.

Statement by the UNCCD Executive Secretary Ibrahim Thiaw: Land sustains life on the planet.   Land provides us with food, clean water, and energy.  Healthy land is the basis for our own health. Yet, one in five hectares of land is no longer usable.  Land degradation is affecting 40% of the world’s population and costing more than 10% of the annual global GDP. As I speak, at least one million people are facing starvation because of drought.  At least 24 countries are hit by drought in 2021 only.  From 1998 to 2017, droughts have affected at least 1.5 billion people, and led to economic losses of USD 124 billion across the globe.  Land-based solutions provide us with an opportunity to recover better.  Build a more inclusive and sustainable world.  Using the Sustainable Development Agenda  and the Paris Agreement as our blueprint.  Land restoration has co-benefits with all Sustainable Development Goals and must be at the centre of our efforts, providing cost-effective solutions for green recovery at scale.   Today’s Dialogue has been a pivotal moment.  Our next steps should take us to the right direction. From what we heard today from Member States, from the UN leadership and various other stakeholders, we are in a position to capture key points expressed and make the following call:   First, building ambition on land stewardship among different stakeholders as we move into the UN Decade for Ecosystem Restoration.  I believe the general thread from this UNGA Dialogue supports multiple regional large-scale restoration programmes.  The Dialogue underscores the need to adapt our production and consumption patterns if we are to insulate our economies and our societies from further catastrophic degradation of our natural capital.  The Dialogue comforts the G20 Global Initiative to reduce degraded land by 50 percent by 2040. And points to the direction of the recent G7 Summit.  Second,  investing in land-based solutions to sustain COVID-19 recovery efforts, especially in rural economies, as they are win-wins for stimulus investment.  Land restoration is low tech, democratic, accessible to all.  Land restoration is one of the cheapest solutions to the climate crisis and is a foundation for a steady post-COVID economic recovery.  Third, helping us get the financing right to scale up land restoration and translate those commitments into concrete, immediate action.  Investing in land restoration secures food production; combats poverty; reduces risks of unwanted migration and insecurity.  Investing in ecosystem restoration is securing sustainable economic recovery, as at least 40% of the global GDP depends on nature. Land restoration is not divisive. It can unite us. Rich and poor. North and South. Governments and Civil Society. Public and Private Sector.  Our youth and women are at the front lines of action. We ought to work together: reconnecting people and nature through a high-level ambition on land stewardship.  For the sake of the planet. For our own sake.    We have a window of opportunity to champion a new restoration narrative and bring back nature into balance for all.  Both now and for the generations to come.  That’s Making Peace with Nature.  Thank you.