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With an expected 9.5 billion people living on earth by 2050, population pressure, higher consumer expectations and climate change will tax and degrade our natural resource base, especially the LAND. With an increasing awareness of the potential of land to meet public and private development goals, land is being seen as an ever more attractive investment vehicle. The vision for…

Globally, disasters due to natural hazards such as storms, flooding, drought, earthquakes and ocean surge extract an enormous toll in terms of human lives, destruction to crops and livelihoods, and economic losses. The UN International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (UNISDR) estimates that between 2000 and 2012, some 1.2 million people died as a result of disasters; 2.9 billion people were…

Changes in carbon stocks in biomass and soil reflect the integration of processes affecting plant growth and losses from terrestrial organic matter pools. Thus they reflect trends in ecosystem function, soil health and climate, as well as land use and management. This helps detect trends in the processes leading to and the management of climate change, desertification/ land degradation and…

Deserts and desert margins are unique, highly adapted ecosystems that support important plant and animal diversity as well as over 500 million people – nearly 8 per cent of the global population. One of the harshest terrains inhabited by humans, they can also be a major driver of innovation. The Kubuqi Desert, the 7th largest desert in China, is almost completely encircled by the…

This report examines the scientific basis for the use of remotely sensed data, particularly the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), for the assessment of land degradation at different scales and for a range of applications, including resilience of agroecosystems. Evidence is drawn from a wide range of investigations, primarily from the scientific peer-reviewed literature but…

This report examines the scientific basis for the use of remotely sensed data, particularly the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), for the assessment of land degradation at different scales and for a range of applications, including resilience of agroecosystems. Evidence is drawn from a wide range of investigations, primarily from the scientific peer-reviewed literature but…