Biodiversity for food and agriculture is indispensable to food security and sustainable development. It supplies many vital ecosystem services, such as creating and maintaining healthy soils, pollinating plants, controlling pests and providing habitat for wildlife, including for fish and other species that are vital to food production and agricultural livelihoods.
 
Analysis of data from a survey in the Tigray region of Ethiopia showed that maintaining a large number of barley varieties reduced the risk of crop failure, with the effect being particularly marked in areas affected by land degradation

Overgrazing is mentioned as a problem by countries from most regions. For example, Spain mentions that stocking rates on its rangelands are higher or lower than those appropriate for local conditions, especially in the Mediterranean region, and that this is leading to land degradation in several locations.

A number of countries note that environmental drivers such as climate change and land degradation are compromising women’s involvement in the use and management of BFA.
Although a figure of 10 percent to 20 percent rangeland degradation is often cited, there is no scientific consensus about the definition or the extent of rangeland degradation

IPBES (2018a) notes that rangelands are among the ecosystems most affected by land degradation and that, in many rangelands, livestock stocking density is at or above the land’s long-term carrying capacity, leading to long-term declines in plant and animal production.

It concludes that “the capacity of rangelands to support livestock will continue to diminish in the future, due to both land degradation and loss of rangeland area

Sustainable Development Goal 15.3 calls on governments to “strive to achieve a degradation neutral world.” In response to the adoption of this goal, the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification’s Land Degradation Neutrality Target Setting Programme has received commitments from 121 countries to date, and is rolling out technical support to refine these commitments and plan their implementation

Severe soil erosion and land degradation linked to soil-disturbing practices, such as tillage and lack of maintenance of soil cover – along with the increasing costs and poor climate-change adaptability of conventional tillage agriculture – have led to the widespread introduction of conservation agriculture worldwide over the last three decades.