Stories

Buenos Aires, Argentina – Partners of Initiative 20x20 representing governments, impact investors, companies and technical experts met to advance the alignment of policies and investments for landscape restoration across Latin America and the Caribbean. The Initiative brings together seventeen Latin American countries, which have committed to restore twenty million hectares of degraded land by 2020 as part of the goals set forth by the Bonn Challenge. For Initiative 20x20, restoration is about recovering and maintaining the functions of the land – ecological, economic, productive, social and cultural – through sustainable systems of agroforestry, silvopasture and other land uses. It also promotes natural or assisted reforestation as well as conservation of forests and other landscapes while avoiding deforestation, since all these elements are fundamental to an integrated restoration process. This fifth annual meeting became a platform for harnessing investment and public policy to help restore lands region-wide. During the meeting, the UNCCD invited Argentinian Secretary of Environment and Sustainable Development Rabbi Sergio Bergman to attend the upcoming COP14 in New Delhi, India, and take part in the international dialogue on the role of spiritual communities in promoting value-based approach to land stewardship. Rabbi has stated that the importance of land goes beyond economic, physical and social importance, but also holds a spiritual value, known and respected by ancestral cultures and peoples.   Read more: 20x20 Initiative The Bonn Challenge

Bonn, Germany – A tree planting ceremony to mark the twenty-fifth anniversary of UNCCD took place at the UN Campus in Bonn, attended by the Mayor of Bonn and many other distinguished guests. UN staff members, visitors and media gathered in front of the Langer Eugen building, where a young Liquidambar (sweetgum) tree was planted, symbolizing friendship and cooperation between the UN and its host city of Bonn as well as longevity, vision and ambition for a better future for all. "It is twenty five years since the UNCCD was adopted. So, this is a year of celebration. We celebrate what has been achieved. We think more about land now; there is an increasing realization that land feeds us and provides us with much of what we really need.  It can help us mitigate and adapt to climate change and stem the loss of biodiversity. We know more about land now; our data and science on land use are now cutting edge and increasingly space-based.  We can take smarter decisions, so land use in our 197 Parties gets back into balance." – said UNCCD Executive Secretary Ibrahim Thiaw during the ceremony. "Wherever the climate changes, our land will degrade, and our biodiversity will die. Where trees grow, our land will stay healthy and nourishing, offering habitats and preserving life. So there is no better way to mark the anniversary of the Convention dedicated to combating land degradation than planting a tree." – emphasized Mayor of Bonn Ashok Sridharan. "Look how the world has changed in twenty five years. Now climate is a global issue, it is on the global agenda, everyone is striving for it." – said Mr. Stefan Schmitz  of the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). The initiative is part of the celebrations that mark the twenty-fifth anniversary of UNCCD and the 2019 World Day to Combat Desertification.  You can access the Executive Secretary's full speech here.  

Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso – “We are the land defending itself!” Nearly 400 participants from 40 different countries, representing 240 organizations, met at the International Civil Society Summit Desertif’Actions from 19-21 June to address land, climate and biodiversity. The summit was organized by the associations CARI, SPONG and the UNCCD Secretariat. It also served as a preparatory meeting for the forthcoming 14th Conference of the Parties to the UNCCD (COP14), which will be held from 2-13 September this year in New Delhi. The participants sent a strong message to the world through their outcome statement: “We are convinced that we, development actors, must raise awareness among forces present in the farming, pastoral, and oasis environments, as well as in many others, as we are all together citizens of the world: together, we are not defenders of the land fighting desertification, we ARE the land defending itself!” The summit was opened by Mr. Bassiere Batio Nestor, Minister of Environment, Green Economy and Climate Change in Burkina Faso. Mr. Ibrahim Thiaw, Executive Secretary of the UNCCD, Ms. Juliette Compaore, President and the board of directors of the Secrétariat Permanent des ONG (SPONG) and Mr. Patrice Burger, President of CARI. “The UNCCD is at the heart of the action. Civil society has an essential and multidimensional role to play,” Thiaw said in his opening statement. Noting that this is the 25th year of the UNCCD, he invited the participants “to look at the horizon of the next 25 years, reflecting on the roles and responsibilities of civil society in combating desertification and mitigating the effects of drought.” The Summit addressed the issue on the Great Green Wall for the Sahara and the Sahel, the importance of land rights and governance in achieving land degradation neutrality, the role of the pastoralist people to combat desertification and the ways to improve water management in the drylands. The outcome document of the Summit will be transmitted to the COP14 by the participants.

Bonn, Germany - Under the theme “Rights in the Landscape,” over 600 participants of the 2019 Bonn Global Landscapes Forum shared the vision towards a more inclusive and sustainable future in which the rights of indigenous communities and women are recognized and sustainable land management is promoted under such recognition. During the session on Decade on Ecosystem Restoration, the UNCCD Deputy Executive Secretary Pradeep Monga stressed the balanced approach to achieving land degradation neutrality by having a common voice for global movements for ecosystem restoration among others. The 14th Conference of the Parties to the UNCCD (COP14), which will be held in New Delhi from 2-13 September this year, will address responsible land governance as a fundamentally important component of sustainable land management and as a contributing factor to the achievement of land degradation neutrality. At the 13th Conference of the Parties to the UNCCD (COP13), more than 80 Ministers from around the world issued the Ordos Declaration which acknowledged the importance of effective, accountable and inclusive institutions, sound policies and incentives, good governance and the rule of law to improving land governance for sustainable land management and access to ownership and control over land. It encouraged countries to give due consideration to the dissemination, promotion and implementation of the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests in the context of National Food Security.

Delegates from Guatemala, Honduras, Belize, Uruguay, Costa Rica, El Salvador and Cuba, together with representatives of the German government, attended the fifth meeting of the Bonn Challenge/Latin America on 12–13 June 2019. They delegates from the governments, CSOs and academia met to discuss the role of landscape restoration in climate change adaptation as well as national perspectives on reforestation and revival of landscapes in 2020–2030.

Ankara, Türkiye – On the occasion of the Word Day to Combat Desertification, His Excellency Mahdi Mohammed Gulaid, Deputy Prime Minister of Somalia, congratulated the three laureates of the 2019 Land for Life Award.   First prize: MERET project of the Ministry of Agriculture of Ethiopia, created to respond to food crises in the 1970s. Since then, it has enabled the restoration of more than 2.5 million hectares of degraded watersheds in more than 72 districts, reducing food shortages by 50 per cent and lifting millions of people out of poverty.   Second prize: Mr. Mathieu Ouedraogo from Burkina Faso, for his lifelong commitment in land restoration, developing and promoting contour stone bunds – a simple water harvesting technique combined with zaï planting, which proved very efficient in empowering farmers of the Sahel region.   2019 Land for Life China Award: Mr. Yun Da, incumbent head of the Department of Finance of Tibet Autonomous Region, for playing an active role in overcoming technological challenges to plant trees in the high-altitude Nagqu area of Tibet, alleviating poverty through ecological compensation by creating close to 300 000 foresting-related jobs. Read more: Detailed information about the winners Detailed information about the finalists