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Disruptive financial innovations and technologies can play a key role in advancing global efforts to address desertification, land degradation and drought while delivering greater opportunities for agricultural producers and national economies. Many financial solutions already exist, but they are often unevenly implemented or not widely available. Close to one-third of adults – 1.7 billion about half of whom were women – still did not have access to financial services in 2017, according to the latest Findex data.  Financial inclusion is also instrumental to the secure disbursement of funds by donors as well as to the operation of civil society organizations, especially in remote rural areas. It is an enabler of eight of the seventeen Sustainable Development Goals and is a key tool for achieving gender equality and empowering women financially. A new report "Financial and digital inclusion for last mile payments: Trends, sustainable land use and disruptive financial service options," published by the Global Mechanism of UNCCD, explores the range of elements that make up financial inclusion and last-mile payments, and can significantly contribute to addressing the challenges of land degradation and drought while empowering the most vulnerable and underserved populations, specifically women and youth. Mobile banking and payments provide affordable and convenient access to financial services, especially in rural areas, while carbon credits can create incentives for landholders and farmers adopting sustainable land management practices to combat land degradation and desertification. The report provides successful examples of innovative financial solutions and technologies that can be scaled up to support new business models and generate economic benefits while restoring soil health, reducing land degradation, preventing forced migration, improving food security, protecting biodiversity and supporting climate resilience.

One year into the project, the collaboration between UNCCD, FAO, Aduna, Orgiis and GLOBHE already bears fruit: individual baobab trees can be now recognized from space and a computer system has been trained to plot them on a map. In the Sahel region, where trees play an important role in fixating soils, providing a barrier to land degradation and supporting food security, the baobab is particularly valued, as its fruit not only has a variety of local uses, but can also be a viable commercial export and a source of sustainable income. An icon of the African landscape revered as the tree of life, baobabs cannot be grown on plantations. Proudly standing big and wild, each one is unique and cherished by local communities, as it provides nourishment for people and their animals. Faced with the advance of the climate change, growing energy needs, rapid urbanization and a depleting stock of seedlings that grow to maturity, these green giants need to be carefully monitored and protected. Recent advances in the spatial resolution and availability of satellite imagery have enabled the detection of individual trees from space. Using FAO’s cloud computing platform SEPAL and dense time-series approaches helps identify individual tree species through phenology, or the seasonal foliage pattern, often unique to individual species. The next challenge was pinning down the actual locations of baobab trees and “training” a classification system to extrapolate and predict the tree species associated with each tree canopy. Drone data provided by GLOBHE at a very high spatial resolution allows identification of baobabs, and the  tree locations are then combined with the phenology data to map individual baobabs over vast geographic regions. The resulting maps can be used to inform local communities of the location, number and condition of the baobabs, and enable them “to visualize and analyze high resolution satellite imagery from their mobile phones, allowing to actively monitor and protect this natural resource,” says Yelena Finegold, FAO Forestry Officer. This collaboration between global satellite data providers, drone operators, the private enterprise, the UN and local communities, including women and youth, is a major step toward improving monitoring, conservation and restoration methods in the Sahel. As the project advances toward mapping the baobabs over larger geographical areas, it can also support the implementation of the Great Green Wall Initiative. Better understanding of where to conserve and invest in long-term sustainable use of baobabs can promote value chain development and enable better land management decisions to monitor and safeguard these green powerhouses that provide sustenance, store water and enrich the land. image (c) MakeWaves Media

Healthy food, healthy climate, healthy planet: they are all impossible without healthy soil. Soil is literally the foundation of human wellbeing on this planet. That’s why on World Soil Day we celebrate this precious and precarious layer of life-giving substance. Almost 99% of our calories come from land. So we can say soil is where our food begins. It can take up to a thousand years to produce just one inch of soil. But it only takes moments to destroy it – through flash floods or sand and dust storms that strip our fertile topsoil. Every five seconds, the equivalent of one soccer field is eroded. We must urgently change the way we care for our land and the way we feed our world of eight billion people. Diversifying cropping system, no-till farming, replacing chemical fertilizers and pesticides with organic alternatives are just some solutions that can lead to healthier soils and more nutritious foods. Beyond food, soil is a mighty ally in mitigating and adapting to climate change. More organic carbon can be stored in the soil than in vegetation and atmosphere combined. Restoring degraded land makes it a powerful carbon sink. Finally, the world’s soils are teeming with biodiversity: they are home to one trillion times more bacteria than there are stars in the universe! Fungi is an essential part of healthy soil. It breaks down organic matter so that nutrients become available for plants. And then there are over 2,700 species of earthworms. These vital but under-appreciated creatures keep our soil alive and fertile. This World Soil Day and every day, let’s celebrate our soil, let’s cherish our soil, let’s save our soil. Thank you.

Fertile soil is a vital resource of livelihoods, prosperity and human well-being for millions across the Central Asia region. At the same time, desertification, land degradation and drought (DLDD), spurred on by climate change, pose a growing threat to soil health across the region. Around 1/3 of the region's land area is degraded, one of the highest rates in the world, according to UNCCD data. In his World Soil Day message  Executive Secretary Ibrahim Thiaw remarked that “soil is literally the foundation of human wellbeing on this planet. That’s why on World Soil Day we celebrate this precious and precarious layer of life-giving substance.” To highlight the urgency of preserving and restoring soil for a food-secure future, Kazakhstan, with the support of the FAO country office, marked this year’s World Soil Day by holding a yearly scientific conference with government representatives, scientists, journalists and industry on key issues of sustainable soil management. In his opening remarks, Baglhan Bekbauov, Vice Minister of Agriculture of the Republic of Kazakhstan, reflected that “Land resources are of exceptional importance for the livelihood, prosperity, well-being (…) and the way of life of both our contemporaries and our future generations.” In her presentation, the UNCCD RLO for CEE Nadezda Dementieva underscored the urgent need to combat land degradation, raising political momentum to activate the land restoration agenda at global, regional and national levels. She also presented the UNCCD´s flagship publication, the 2nd edition of the Global Land Outlook, which focuses on diverse pathways that countries and communities can adopt to reverse land degradation through fit-to-purpose land restoration agendas. Kazakhstan´s active engagement in the World Soil Day activities reflects the importance UNCCD places on combatting desertification across the entire region. Recognizing the key role of achieving a neutral balance of land degradation to slow down DLDD, five Central Asian countries – Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan – have already joined the UNCCD Land Degradation Neutrality Programme, striving to reach no net loss of healthy and productive land. Uzbekistan also holds the distinction of being the first Central Asian country to host an official UNCCD conference, the 21st session of the UNCCD Committee for the Review of the Implementation of the Convention (CRIC21) in Samarkand from 9 to 13 October 2023.

For most of us, food goes beyond simple nutrition and sustenance: it shapes our traditions, brings us together and creates lasting memories. World Food Day is an occasion to celebrate the diversity of our foods and to ponder the future: which foods will feature on our communal table as the world population continues to grow and the planet’s climate continues to change? With 99 per cent of all the calories we consume coming from land, protecting its lasting productivity equals safeguarding our future food supply. World Food Day 2022 is taking place amidst multiple global challenges that put the world off track to secure good food for all by 2030. One of the obstacles is the growing number of droughts that affect countries in all parts of the world – up 29 per cent since 2000, with more frequent and more severe droughts on the horizon. Securing the future of our food and those who produce it against drought is a key priority for UNCCD. No country or region is immune to drought, but all countries can work together to better prepare and respond to this urgent and global challenge. When speaking of drought resilience, it is important to recognize that drought is not just the absence of rain: it is often the result of poor land management. We cannot hope to have enough resources to feed the world’s population that’s set to reach 10 billion by 2050 without changing the way we produce, distribute and consume our food. The current food systems have already taken up 40 per cent of the world’s land surface — an area the size of Asia — and caused 80 per cent of all deforestation. The future of our food depends on reshaping our food systems toward sustainable agricultural practices – such as agroforestry, agro-pastoralism and use of drought-tolerant crops. For example, maize is a staple food for more than 300 million people in Africa, but by the 2030s drought and rising temperatures could render 40 per cent of the continent’s maize-growing area unsuitable for current varieties. In response, researchers have developed more than 160 maize varieties for sub-Saharan Africa that yield 25-30 per cent more than farmers’ standard varieties under drought. More than two million smallholder farmers in sub-Saharan Africa are now growing drought-tolerant maize varieties that build resilience and increase yields and productivity. Many successful approaches proven to keep land fertile and protected from drought are also centered on empowering rural women, who produce 60–80 per cent of our food, to emoloy the ancestral knowledge of nurturing their land with secure tenure and modern technology. This World Food Day is an opportunity to remind ourselves that no matter where we are along the food production and supply chain, we all depend on the secure future of our food. As we sit down to dinner, let’s commit to improving our relationship with food by making smart consumer choices, supporting sustainable agricultural producers and choosing plant-based diets focused on resource-efficient crops. We invite you to explore the Dry Delights content featured in our Droughland campaign: (re)discover some drought-resilient foodstuffs and pick your favorite! Making smart choices starts on our plates and supports better production, better nutrition, better drought resilience and a better life on land. 

Nearly 670 million people will still be facing hunger in 2030 – 8 percent of the world population. This is equivalent to the population facing hunger in 2015 when Agenda 2030 was launched. What’s more, access to food is not necessarily leading to healthier eating, mainly because food and agricultural policies are not aligned with delivering healthy food. Governments need to repurpose food and agricultural policies to make healthy diets affordable. This is the conclusion of The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2022  (SOFI 2022) Report released Tuesday, 5 July 2022, by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). SOFI is published every year to track progress towards reaching the 2030 sustainable development goal of ending hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition in all its forms. The latest report presents an update on the situation of hunger and malnutrition around the world. Globally, between 720 million and 828 million people faced hunger in 2021, about 150 million more people since COVID-19 broke out. The last report identified conflict, climate extremes and economic shocks as the key drivers of hunger and malnutrition. To these, SOFI 2022 adds policies that lead to inequality. Policies are no longer having a significant effect in reducing hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition in all its forms, SOFI 2022 states. And in fragile economies, there are constraints to using financial policies to transform agrifood systems. For instance, all over the world, financial support is directed mainly to produce staple foods, such as rice, sugar and meat, not fruits and vegetables. As a result, fruits and vegetables are more expensive and unaffordable. Moreover, food and agricultural policies are not aligned with the promotion of healthy diets. Further, the war in Ukraine is affecting supply chains, in turn raising the costs of fertilizer, energy, and food, such as grains, especially in the first half of 2022. Considering the unfolding challenging economic situation globally, the report states that public-private partnerships are needed to boost investment. However, partnerships require the support of a robust governance system to ensure vulnerable communities benefit, and not powerful industry players. The second edition of the Global Land Outlook (GLO2) released in April 2022 also calls attention to the issue of food insecurity. It spotlights the impacts of modern agriculture on food systems that alter the land and the impacts of globalizing food systems. Global food systems are responsible for 80% of deforestation, 70% of freshwater use, and the single greatest cause of terrestrial biodiversity loss. The disconnect between where food is produced and consumed is key. In the past, local consumption led to land degradation. Behind this rapid land use change today are the demand for food internationally and for urban communities. GLO2 urges the international community to re-think its global food systems. It calls for a turn to the sustainable management of the land, which experience shows can “both improve the productivity of the land and reduce the cost of food production.” The international community has committed to restore one billion hectares of land by 2030, an area the size of the United States or China. GLO2 points to hundreds of practical ways to carry out the desired ecosystem restoration at local, national and regional levels. This year’s SOFI report is a joint initiative of the FAO, International Food and Agriculture Development (IFAD), United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), World Food Programme (WFP) and the World Health Organization (WHO). The brief and full reports are now available online.