Other meetings & events

The Soil Leadership Academy (SLA) launched its land degradation neutrality (LDN) ​support platform at the UNCCD's 12th Conference of the Parties in Ankara, Türkiye. Public and private high-level decision-makers were guided to the tools available to assist each decision-making step on the road to LDN, while also discovering how LDN can help to achieve national or corporate priorities. An interactive simulation tool guided participants through the standard, five-step policy-making process, giving them the chance to choose the outcomes of each step. Decision-makers were also given a portfolio of the resources and capacity-building opportunities offered by our partners to best support their achievement of LDN. Related Documents Media Briefing Programme Partner Presentations CGIAR Economics of Land Degradation FAO Global Mechanism IUCN UNCCD: LDN Fund Turkish Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Livestock UNCCD: Monitoring and Evaluation University of Leeds World Resources Institute  

Women's Empowerment for a Land Degradation Neutral World The UNCCD COP12 Gender Day focused on three dimensions of policy action to ensure women are agents of positive change and that they are able to eradicate poverty and become resilient to climate change. These dimensions are land rights, decision-making and resilience. During the COP12 session, high-ranking delegates and civil society organizations stressed the importance of gender-responsive strategies in the implementation of the Convention, going forward. Above, participants at the UNCCD COP12 Gender Day in Ankara, Türkiye. The main goal of the Gender Day event was to identify the policy actions needed to boost women’s empowerment so that they can play a more effectives role in creating wealth for their families and minimizing the negative effects of climate change that they face at the family, community, national and global levels. The event was informed by a three-part series global study titled, Women’s Empowerment in the drylands, which was jointly commissioned by the UNDP and UNCCD, as a follow-up to the recommendations of the COP11 Gender Day. The priority areas of action identified are contained in this brief report. The COP12 Gender Day was jointly organized by FAO, IUCN, UNCCD, UNDP, Gender Unit of the University of Namibia (UNAM) and WOCAN and was made possible through the financial support of the Government of Finland. Follow-up activities with these partners on these issues is envisioned, with a view to promote and monitor gender mainstreaming in the projects and activities supported by the UNCCD and in order to build synergy among the Rio Convention partners – the Convention on Biological Diversity, UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Global Environment Facility. The UNCCD COP12 Gender Day builds on the Windhoek Initiative on Women’s Empowerment contained in the Namibia Declaration, a key outcome of the UNCCD COP11 Gender Day, held in Windhoek, Namibia. Opening Session The Executive Secretary of UNCCD, the Namibian Minister of Environment and Tourism and the Ambassador of Finland opened the event while the South African Deputy Minister of Environmental Affairs delivered the Keynote address. Former President of Finland and UNCCD Drylands Ambassador, Ms. Tarja Halonen, delivered a video-message, at the event, which had more than 100 people in attendance. Ms. Pervin Sarvan, the head of the last remaining indigenous community in Türkiye – the Yoruk people and Ms. Silvia Hämmerle, Chairwoman of the Life-Giving Forest eV, and winner of the Terre de Femmes Award also spoked at the opening session. Above: the lineup of speakers (l-r), Pervin Saravan and Fatma Karata, Monique Barbut (UNCCD), H.E. Barbara Thomson (South Africa), Hon. Pohamba Shifeta (Namibia), Ambassador Nina Vaskunlahti (Finland) and Silvia Hämmerle (Life-Giving Forest ev) Session 1: Ensuring Women Land Rights for a Sustainable Future Women make up more than 40% of the agricultural sector, yet 95% of the agricultural training excludes them. This session raised awareness about the situation of women’s land rights globally and the implications for the sustainable management of natural resources. Drawing on concrete country examples, the event showed best practices in governance of land tenure for strengthening large scale land rehabilitation and restoration approaches. Strengthening Dryland Women’s Land Rights: Local Contexts, Global Change: Lara Forsyth, University of Greenwich in the United Kingdom, presented the results of the study on Women’s Land Rights. She found that women in the drylands are characterised by insecure land rights, due to various factors, including inappropriate policies, overlapping tenure systems and poor capacity at local level. The failure to recognize women’s land rights and the absence of women’s representation in land governance result in the lack of equitable distribution of land rights for dryland communities and women, and need to be addressed through policy. Above, Ms. Umadevi Swaminatha, SEWA, speaks about women's land rights in India Session 2: Drylands Women and Resilience Building This session highlighted women’s strategic role in building resilient livelihoods and ecosystems in the drylands, underlined the challenges and opportunities for enhancing their role and identified strategic actions to mobilize potential partners. Gender Justice at the Household Level: The core argument is that women in these areas spend their income on households. Therefore, the real impact of enhancing women’s livelihoods needs to be assessed further. Two issues stood out. First, the need for social mechanisms targeting women, with Ethiopia and Tunisia as positive examples of what that means in practice. Second, the importance of engaging with men and community leaders on gender justice. Women are Important Development Actors: Women have difficulty accessing finance. But at the very least, micro-finance projects targeting women need to be encouraged because of their high added value for combating poverty and desertification, and building food security and resilience. Livestock: Livestock production activities such as animal fattening and dairy processing need to be encouraged for women. Well designed, they can contribute to women’s empowerment and resilience building. Resilience is a key concept in improving livelihoods and ecosystems in the drylands. Gender equality is vital to building resilience. It calls for: improved recognition of women’s rights, knowledge and contribution; better representation for women in dryland decision-making; and the redistribution of resources and services for more equitable outcomes. Above, Elie Kodsi, UNDP, explains the livelihoods challenges facing drylands women Session 3: Land Degradation Neutrality: Seeing Through the Gender Lens This session covered four areas: the status of the gender implementation in the three Rio Conventions; the ROAM tool designed to mainstream gender in landscape restoration; the experience and lessons learned from this tool; and lessons learned from the successful project on gender mainstreaming in India’s Uttarakhand Watershed Sector. Implementing Gender Commitments of the Rio Conventions: Are we the Change we Want to See?: The presentation focused primarily on the capacities that the three MEA’s have to support gender mainstreaming. It concluded that the internal capacities of the three Rio Conventions in terms of gender need to be strengthened in order to support Parties and other stakeholders to effectively mainstream gender. Mind the Gap: The Value of Gender-Responsive Approach in Forest Landscape Restoration: This presentation of the Restoration Opportunities Assessment Methodology (ROAM), underlined the risks of ignoring gender in restoration activities and the need for rooting gender responsive initiatives in solid gender analyses. Addressing Gender to Ensure Achieving Land Degradation Neutrality: The key lessons from using ROAM in Jordan were: accountability is vital for the ownership and long-term sustainability of the project; gender mainstreaming shifts the focus not on women, but on gender equity and equality as goals; and a gender-responsive approach being less costly, increases project effectiveness and ensures equitable access to livelihoods. Gender Mainstreaming in the Pursuit of Land Degradation Neutrality in Uttarakhand Watershed Sector: GEF Initiative: Some of the key lessons from gendered projects like this one are: the value of NGOs in mobilizing women social workers; setting a mandatory percentage for women’s participation in local project-related institutions; the importance of administrative reforms that give women control over financial disbursements; the creating alternative livelihoods sources; providing resources directly to women. Above, participants listen to and watch the presentations Session 4: Where are the Women in Decision-Making? The fourth session was an interactive discussion. The moderator poses questions to each panelist in order to deepen discussion on how to transform local and national governance structures in order to scale up women’s decision-making powers in policy processes, from the global to local levels. Lora Forsythe, University of Greenwich: Based on a global study, she found cultural norms are still the greatest barrier to women’s empowerment in dryland countries. Working with men can help to roll-back social and cultural norms and stereotypes. Lack of information and communication is an obstacle to women knowing their rights; they continue using customary law even where laws that recognize women’ rights to land exist. However, allocating quotas for gender equality alone are insufficient; building women’s capacity to participate in decision-making is vital. Christine Monsieur, FAO: DIMITRA cubs in West Africa are empowering women. They give a voice to women, and can help them to negotiate their land rights allocation. The DIMITRA experience shows that transformation occurs where there is collective action. With self-esteem comes behavior change and a change in gender roles, leading to participation in income generating activities, and improved sanitation among other achievements. Zeliha Unaldi, UN Women: The impact of climate change on women and men are differentiated by division of labor, which in turn is strongly influenced by cultural norms. She stressed the need to improve access to information in order to increase self-confidence in women. Anna Sidona Hakusembe, Namibia, Representative in Communal Land Boards: Cultural norms hinder women’s participation and enhance men’s dominance in decision-making processes in Namibia. Empowering women requires targeting women, who are willing to participate, at the inception of project intervention. It ensures ownership and sustained progression of activities after the closure of projects. A collective approach whereby all stakeholders from local leaders, government extension officers, local communities all work together in planning and implementation of activities is necessary. Above, session panelists (l-r), Immaculate Mogotsi (UNAM), Christiane Monsieur (FAO), Lara Forsythe (Uni. of Greenwich), Anna Hakusembe and Zeliha Unalidi (UN Women, Türkiye). Session 5: Report and Recommendations The rapporteurs of each session presented the outcomes of each session, highlighting the policy, institutional and capacity-buidling requirements needed at the UNCCD, Party and other stakeholder levels to ensure gender is front and center in future global efforts to avoid degrading and to restore degraded land. The report is here. During the high-level segment held the following week, on 20-21 October, parties and civil society organizations called for greater attention to gender. The Ankara Ministerial Declaration, the ministers commited to "dedicate ourselves to promoting gender equality and the role of women as actors of change in addressing DLDD." Above, Ms. Sakhile Koketso, Convention on Biological Diversity, facilitating the report back session. The Background Studies The papers consist of three thematic studies and one synthesis report. Each of the thematic studies explored the issues of gender justice with respect to land rights, governance and resilience. More specifically: Thematic study 1 - Strengthening dryland women’s land rights: local contexts, global change outlines various key opportunities existing for facilitating dryland women’s empowerment with respect to land, in international research, policy, dialogue and practical action. Thematic study 2 - Gender and drylands governance: empowering women for change focuses on the significant opportunities existing for facilitating dryland women’s empowerment in governance, in the context of wider support for processes seeking greater democracy in dryland governance and values. Thematic study 3: Achieving Dryland Women’s Empowerment: Environmental resilience and social transformation provides the overview of major opportunities to strengthen the resilience of dryland environments and for women to actively contribute to and benefit from sustainable drylands development. Above, Plenty of networking opportunities are available during lunch and cocktails in the evening. For more information on Gender Day or the UNCCD's work on gender, contact: Ms. Wagaki Wischnewski, wwischnewski@unccd.int  

This year's theme is “attainment of food security for all through sustainable food systems”, with the slogan: “No such thing as a free lunch. Invest in healthy soils.” A WDCD global observance event was held in Milan, Italy during the 2015 United Nations Expo.

The United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) launched its first short writing contest this year in order to understand the different ways in which people around the world describe their relationship to land. More than 230 submissions from nearly 50 countries were made by applicants aged between 7 and 77 years old. The contest had a category for children and youth and a category for the general public. The contest’s theme “Land nurturing people nurturing life” prompted many great responses. We asked participants the following questions: How would you express your relationship with land in a poem? What does land mean to you? Do you know any proverb about land in your country? Is it still relevant in your today’s life? The submissions were creative, revealing and insightful. They varied in literary expression and style, ranging from proverbs and short Haiku-style pieces to short stories. Many of the stories present the land as a mother figure and advocate for immediate action to restore and protect the land and its resources.In recognition of the high quality of submissions, the UNCCD secretariat will publish the best submissions in its future publications, acknowledging the authors by name and age. 2015 short writing contest winners Mr Mohamed Aseen Nasrulla from the Maldives and Mr Yesashimwe Néhémie from Rwanda are the winners of the first short-writing contest of the UNCCD. Nasrulla was the winner in the children’s category for people aged 15 and younger, while 24 year old Yesashimwe Néhémie won the adult category. The winners were announced on UNCCD World Day to Combat Desertification 17 June 2015. Written from the land’s perspective, Mohamed describes the negative shift in appreciation toward land and the significance of the mutual relationship between land and people. From worship to abuse, he emphasizes the importance of recognizing the land’s vulnerable state and hopes that the world understands land restoration can no longer wait. Read his short story "GAIA".   Regarding his winning submission, Mohamed said, “I am indeed grateful for getting a chance to an article to promote the vital role of nature for living beings. I would like to thank the UNCCD for providing such a great opportunity for those who live in different parts of the world and look forward for more such opportunities.” In a letter addressed to Land, Yesashimwe pledges to protect and nourish the land and contribute to its restoration. Regarding land as a mother, he vows to encourage others to treat land with “respect and care.” Read his piece "Saving my other mother".   Responding to the announcement, Yesashimwe said, “I can't find proper terms to express my happiness, but all I can say is: 2015 is a wonderful year to me!” Néhémie will receive a financial award of USD 500 and Mr. Nasrulla an award of USD 300.

Land degradation neutrality (LDN) is included in Sustainable Development Goal 15.3 Life on Land. The Soil Leadership Academy (SLA) project, in synergy with other UNCCD initiatives, aims to be a front runner in providing support for achieving LDN. It will provide practical and pragmatic skills and knowledge, leverage on the experience of the SLA partners, to support decision makers, public or private in achieving LDN. As a platform for sharing knowledge and experience, SLA would like to establish partnerships with other initiatives and organizations that can bring a positive contribution to supporting the achievement of LDN. The Nexus Conference brings together various organizations and government agencies, to build a collaborative nexus approach to the sustainable management of soil, water and waste. It integrates environmental management and governance across many sectors and scales.  At the Nexus Conference, we raised awareness about the future opportunities of the SLA platform, and invited contributions on the curriculum from conference participants. Alexandru Marchis, SLA project manager, was a speaker at Session 11: Nexus Monitoring Strategies & Management of Environmental Resources. Discussions during the conference and contacts made with potential SLA partners have contributed to the project's further development.