An urgent global problem needs to be addressed: the extent and severity of land degradation worldwide is worrying, and the negative impact on our environment, people and the economy cannot be ignored. Land degradation has significant impacts on societies and economies as it leads to food insecurity, carbon emissions, biodiversity loss, increased pests, reduced availability of clean water and increased vulnerability of affected areas and their populations to climate change. Today, the pressure on land has reached such a critical point that serious doubts have been raised as to the capacity of land to meet the demands of a growing population. On the other hand, solutions for tackling land degradation bring benefits of multiple environmental, social and financial dimensions. Stopping land degradation is a major step toward mitigating climate change, as soil is the second largest carbon storage after the ocean. Land management is also at the heart of many other sustainability issues – it is the instrument that connects the dots between challenges such as food security, poverty, gender equality, water availability and biodiversity. Managing land wisely would allow the world to simultaneously address and alleviate these other global problems.