The United Nations Conference on Desertification (UNCOD), which was held in Nairobi, Kenya, during 29 August - 9 September 1977, a Plan of Action to Combat Desertification. It presents a set of recommendations for initiating and sustaining efforts on the scale required to halt further deterioration of productive lands that are prone to desertification.

The draft plan, as submitted to the Conference, was based on a syntesis of available scientific knowledge formulated in a series of state-of-the-art documents.

The emergent Plan of Action to Combat Desertification, though comprising numerous parts ('Recommendations'), was foreseen as being implemented in its totality. In one dimension it integrated three pricipal operational functions:

1. monitoring ans assessment of desertification hazards and of the resource-potential of threatened lands;
2. planning for programmes that aim at arresting the advance of desertification, while reclaimimg desertified land and developing the resources of these territories as integral parts of national plans for development; and
3. implementation of these programmes through adaptation and application of existing scientific and technological knowledge.