Turning knowledge into power for drought resilience

How Communities of Learning and Practice are speeding action in the face of a new drought era 

Droughts have become one of the defining challenges of our century, fueled by climate change and the growing pressure on land and water resources. Their frequency has surged by nearly 30 per in only 25 years and they already cost the global economy more than USD307 billion each year. While no country is immune to its impacts, drought has different expressions in different lands, calling for tailored solutions.

Humanity has the science, the policy tools and the experience to manage drought risk so it does not become a catastrophe. One of the best ways to access this collective pool of knowledge on what-works-where is to connect with practitioners, decision-makers and experts who face similar issues. Enter the Communities of Learning and Practice (CLPs) on Drought Management.

The CLPs, steered by regional and global co-chairs with support from the Global Water Partnership (GWP) and the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), offer a platform where the drought community can share, interact, collaborate, and learn from each other to speed action on the ground.

From 1 to 5 December, Parties to the UNCCD will convene in Panama to review global progress on land and drought action. In the lead up to the 23rd Conference for the Review of the Implementation of the Convention(CRIC23), we spoke with four CLP co-chairs on why CLPs matter, what they look to achieve, and what is in store:

Europe: regional empowerment

Central and Eastern Europe may not be the first area that comes to mind when thinking about drought. That, says regional CLP co-chair Biljana Kilibarda, is precisely the point.

“Droughts are hitting us harder and more often,” says Kilibarda, who is also the UNCCD focal point for Montenegro. “However, the challenges that drought poses in our region are often underrecognised. 

For Kilibarda,  the CLP for Central and Eastern Europe offers an opportunity to raise the visibility of drought-related risks in the area, promote collaboration between sectors and across borders, and facilitate the exchange of innovative practices, technologies and financial strategies for drought resilience.

Upon signing up, CLP participants can access webinars to build their capacities, discover opportunities and network. All of it, for free. Earlier this year, for example, a webinar with representatives of The World Bank, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and UNCCD explored how to finance the implementation of national drought plans. Various countries in the region then shared their own experiences.

“Our CLP is not just a platform for dialogue,” says Kilibarda. “Above all, it is a strategic tool for collective action and regional empowerment —a tool for a more adaptive future.”

LAC: collective action

Drought knows no borders —and neither do many crucial ecosystems and watersheds. Transboundary water bodies, for example, account for around 60 per cent of global freshwater flows. Hence the importance of coordinating action across borders.

“Countries must join forces to manage drought risk and build resilience,” said Saida Rivero, co-chair of the CLP for Latin America and the Caribbean and coordinator of the national reporting to the UNCCD for Venezuela. “Promoting Integrated action across the region is one of our priorities.”

Drought does not exist in a vacuum. It is worsened by human action, and it triggers cascading and compounding effects that impact societies, economies and ecosystems —even those that are far removed in space and time. 

The CLP raises awareness on the far-reaching impacts of drought, but also on ways to manage its growing risk: governance mechanisms, technical and technological advances, community-led initiatives reduce the vulnerability of people through information and planning. 

Africa: ancestral wisdom

For Dieudonné Ilboudo, CLP co-chair and agropastoral expert at the Ministry of Agriculture of Burkina Faso, the platform has a triple role: adapting global knowledge to local realities; connecting grassroots efforts with drought policy; and encouraging the combination of traditional knowledge with innovations like AI and remote sensing for the integrated management of natural resources.

One ancestral practice that has become a powerful tool for resilience is the Zaï cultivation technique, born in the arid Sahelian region of West Africa. As explained by Ilbuondo, Zaï involves digging small planting pits across degraded land during the dry season. Each pit is filled with organic matter like compost, attracting termites that aerate the soil and enrich it with nutrients. Once the rains begin, the pits capture water, channeling it directly to the plant roots, and so minimizing runoff and evaporation. 

As the Sahel is grappling with desertification, food insecurity and climate change, Zaï pits are transforming barren lands into productive fields.

“Sustainable land and water management are not only an environmental priority,” says Ilboudo. It is also a pathway to peace, food security and dignity for all communities in Africa and beyond.” 

Asia: innovation hub

Ali Darvishi Boolorani, professor at the University of Tehran and co-chair of the Global and Asia CLPs, sees the CLPs as an innovation hub to accelerate local solutions for the planetary problem of desertification, drought and dust.

Whenever drought hits degraded soil across the arid lands of regions like the Middle East, Central Asia and North Africa, the result is dust, explains the expert, who recently lead-authored a global map of dust sources based on remote sensing data. 

Hence the importance, in his view, of having CLPs raise awareness on the link between the ‘three Ds’: “Human action is behind the formation of a staggering 35 per cent of the world’s dust sources, up from an estimated 25 per cent a decade ago. It is vital that human populations and activities stay within the carrying capacity of the land; especially, as the planet continues to warm.”

For the co-chair, CLPs can start and accelerate these and other necessary conversations, contribute to building the skills of the next generation of land and water managers through webinars and support for the development of syllabus, and connect stakeholders with emerging technologies and ideas.

Machine learning, for example, could provide a more adaptive and predictive framework to identify dust source areas under changing climatic conditions and help calculate the economic impacts of drought in different contexts, becoming a valuable addition to drought and dust toolboxes.

“The more people that join the CLPs —says Boololarin— the richer the exchange will be and the faster we will collectively move the needle of drought resilience.”

More information

• Join the Communities of Learning and Practice for Drought management here
• Meett the winners of the CLP Case Study Competition

Join us at CRIC23 to learn more about the CLPs 

• Money Meets Resilience: Innovative Investment Pathways for Drought Action | UNCCD: Monday 1 December at 18:15 local time. Showcase of CLP case study competition winners
• From the Past to the Future: 20 Years of Drought Lessons and New Learning Paths | UNCCD: Wednesday 3 December at 08:30 local time. Launch of online courses hosted by the CLP
• Farmer and Pastoralist-Centric Solutions to Managing Droughts and Safeguarding Livelihoods​ | UNCCD: Friday 5 December at 08:30 local time. CLP Africa showcase with Dieudonné Ilboudo, CLP Africa co-chair and expert from Burkina Faso