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Bonn, Germany – UNCCD has joined other UNBonn organizations on 8 March 2019 to celebrate the International Women's Day. This year’s celebration puts innovation by women and girls, for women and girls, at the heart of efforts to remove barriers to gender equality, accelerate progress for women’s empowerment and improve social protection systems. Addressing the meeting on UN campus, Dr. Heike Kuhn of the Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development presented on-the-ground projects that enable women's empowerment, such as WeCode programming school for women in Uganda. During the follow-up discussions, participants agreed that providing women with access to digital learning is essential for giving them much-needed options to acquire new knowledge and skills without leaving their jobs, families and communities. In his recent op-ed on the occasion of the International Women's Day, the UNCCD Executive Secretary Mr. Ibrahim Thiaw highlighted that science and technology can offer rural women new opportunities to tackle the daily challenges, reduce their workload, raise food production and participate more in the paid labour market. However, the real progress can only be achieved by creating an enabling environment to access these options through secure land rights, financing and education. Learn more: Actions around the world UNCCD Gender Action Plan Land and gender

The First UNCCD Capacity Building Training Fair was held at the Arthur Chung Conference Centre (ACCC) in Georgetown, Guyana. The Training Fair was specifically designed to address the main issues that the UNCCD focuses on, and to strengthen the capacities of the Parties so that they can undertake actions to tackle these challenges. One of the main objectives of this first Fair was to help decision-makers and UNCCD stakeholders increase their capacities both individually and institutionally. The Training Fair ran for two days, 25th and 26th of January 2019, and covered four main areas namely, Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN), Drought, issues of Gender and Stand and Dust Storms (SDS). It began with an opening session chaired by the coordinator of the event, UNCCD’s Capacity Building Officer Dr. Richard A. Byron-Cox. Participants were welcomed by Mr. Trevor L. Benn, Guyana’s Commissioner of Lands and UNCCD National Focal Point, and heard a brief address from UNCCD Deputy Executive Secretary, Mr. Pradeep Monga. The fair was declared officially opened by Honourable Rupert Roopnarine, Minster with responsibility for Public Service of Guyana.

By Ibrahim Thiaw, Under-Secretary General of the UN and Executive Secretary of UNCCD Science and technology offer exciting pathways for rural women to tackle the challenges they face daily. Innovative solutions for rural women can, for example, reduce their workload, raise food production and increase their participation in the paid labour market. But even the very best innovative, gender-appropriate technology makes no sense without access to other critical resources, especially secure land rights, which women in rural areas need to flourish. Land degradation and drought affect, at least, 169 countries. The poorest rural communities experience the severest impacts. For instance, women in areas affected by desertification, easily spend four times longer each day collecting water, fuelwood and fodder. Moreover, these impacts have very different effects on men and women. In the parts of Eritrea impacted most by desertification, for example, the working hours for women exceed those of men by up to 30 hours per week. Clearly, poor rural women would benefit the most from new ways of working on the land. Therefore, technology and innovation must benefit women and men equally for it to work well for society. Even more so at a time when technology is becoming critical to manage the growing threats of desertification, land degradation and drought. In Türkiye, for instance, farmers can get information on when to plant in real time, using an application installed on a mobile phone.[1] However, in most parts of the world, the adoption rates of technology are especially low among rural women, possibly because very often technologies are not developed with rural women land users in mind.[2] For example, a wheelbarrow can reduce the time spent on water transport by 60 per cent. But its weight and bulk makes it physically difficult for most African women to use.[3] The demand for technology design that meets rural women’s specific needs is great. But developing appropriate technology is not enough, if the pre-requisites for technology uptake, in particular access to land, credit and education, are not in place.[4] Today, a web of laws and customs in half the countries on the planet [5] undermine women’s ability to own, manage, and inherit the land they farm.  In nearly many developing countries, laws do not guarantee the same inheritance rights for women and men.[6] In many more countries, with gender equitable laws, local customs and practices that leave widows landless are tolerated. For instance, a 2011 study carried out in Zambia shows that when a male head of household dies, the widow only gets, on average, one-third of the area she farmed before.[7] The impact of such changes on the world’s roughly 258 million widows and the 584 million children who depend on them is significant.[8] It leaves us all worse off.  Globally, women own less land and have less secure rights over land than men.[9] Secure access to land increases women’s economic security, but it has far greater benefits for society more generally. Women who own or inherit land also control the decisions that impact their land, such as the uptake of new technology.  A study in Rwanda shows that recipients of land certificates are twice as likely to increase their investment in soil conservation relative to others. And, if women got formal land rights, they were more likely to engage in soil conservation.[10] Initiatives that benefit rural women do not stop at the household or local levels. At scale, such investments have a huge global impact. If women all over the world had the same access as men to resources for agricultural production, they could increase yields on their farms by 20 to 30 per cent. This could raise the total agricultural output in developing countries substantially at national scales, and reduce the number of undernourished people in the world by 12 to 17 per cent.[11]  If we want to tackle the underlying causes of gender inequality, to build smart and innovate for change, then technology is good. Innovative, gender appropriate technology is better. But these will have little impact if the pre-requisites for its uptake by women, in particular access to land, credit and education, are non-existent. References: Reuters, 2015, article by Manipadma Jena. Türkiye's plan to help farmers adapt to climate change? Ask a tablet Theis, Sophie et al. (2018): What happens after technology adoption? Gendered aspects of small-scale irrigation technologies in Ethiopia, Ghana and Tanzania. Agricultural and Human Values  Ashby, Jacqueline et al ( n.d.) Investing in Women as Drivers of Agricultural Growth, p.3 FAO/IFPRI (2014): Gender specific approaches, rural institutions, and technological innovations, p. 13 et seq, p. 4. Huyer, Sophia, 2016: Closing the Gender Gap in Agriculture, Gender, Technology and Development 20(2) 105–116, p. 108 Huyer, Sophia, 2016: Closing the Gender Gap in Agriculture, Gender, Technology and Development 20(2) 105–116, p. 108 Chapoto, Antony et al. (2011):  Widows’ Land Security in the Era of HIV/AIDS: Panel Survey Evidence from Zambia," Economic Development and Cultural Change 59, no. 3 511-547 Coughenour Betancourt Amy (2018): The Green Revolution reboot: Women’s land rights UN Women, Facts & Figures Ali, D.A. et al (2011): Environmental and Gender Impacts of Land Tenure Regularization in Africa: Pilot Evidence from Rwanda. 28 pp. Sanjak, Jolyne (2018): Women’s Land Rights Can Help Grow Food Security FAO (2011): Closing the gender gap in agriculture

As the UN Convention to Combat Desertification celebrates its 25th year, the 2019 Land for Life Award will be dedicated to “Decades of Impact”. We will recognize efforts that are contributing to land degradation neutrality on a large-scale, with long-term changes and dedicated actions for 25 years or longer and remarkable positive impacts on land, people, communities, and society as a whole. Deadline for nominations is 30 March 2019. More about the selection and nomination process...

The governments of Benin, Burkina Faso and Niger are among the 44 countries that have already committed to develop their national drought plans in the framework of the new UNCCD Drought Initiative. The UNCCD secretariat, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the Global Water Partnership (GWP) are all part of the framework for collaboration to support this UNCCD initiative on drought management. This includes technical and programmatic support along with knowledge-sharing. The first stage of the project included technical consultation meetings on the draft national drought plans that took place in Benin, Burkina Faso and Niger  at the end of last year. Each plan will specify the process for dealing with drought and drought-related activities, such as early warning and forecasting, definition of trigger reporting levels, impact analyses, response recommendations and mitigation measures. In the event of a drought emergency, the plan will identify ways to mitigate the effects of disaster. Read more... Read more: Land and drought The Drought Initiative

Dear colleagues, On the occasion of the UNCCD 25th anniversary and within the implementation of its Gender Action Plan, the UNCCD secretariat is launching a campaign during the month of March to promote gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls.  Every day in the first half of March, we would like to publish stories that portray the work of your organization in empowering women and girls, particularly as described in the GAP. We would highly appreciate if you could share with us one or more of the following before 28 February: An image of the person or family empowered with a quote (140 characters)  An image with a short story (about 350 words)  A one-minute (60 seconds) video clip highlighting the featured person's work and achievements The best contributions will also be used as material for the campaign around the meetings of the Commission on the Status of Women and for the celebrations of the World Day to Combat Desertification on 17 June. You are welcome to send us good stories that you have published in your publications, but please make sure you provide proper referencing (the source of the story). Articles for publication will be selected as they arrive. We are looking for stories that are relevant and heroic. Here is a video on how to write a hero story. Please send us your material by email to cso@unccd.int  Thank you for your commitment to the UNCCD!