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What is desertification?

The Earth is covered by a fragile layer of soil which forms very slowly, but
can be blown and washed away in a few seasons. This is what is now
happening in many areas. Nowhere is the problem more acute than in arid,
semi-arid and dry sub-humid areas, which cover more than one third of the
Earth's surface.
"Desertification" is a process by which susceptible areas lose their
productive capacity. Land degradation is often linked with food security
and poverty, in a cause-effect relationship. The United Nations Convention
to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) attempts to reverse this trend.

Land Degradation
"desertification" means land degradation in arid, semi-arid and dry
sub-humid areas resulting from various factors, including climatic
variations and human activities.

While land degradation occurs everywhere, it is only defined as
"desertification" when it occurs in drylands. Seventy percent of the 5,200
million hectares of drylands used for agriculture around the world are
already degraded (Down to Earth, UNCCD Secretariat).

Susceptible Drylands
The main characteristic of aridity or dryness is the lack of available
moisture in average climatic conditions: arid or dry lands are those that
experience a negative balance between moisture inputs (annual
precipitation levels) and moisture losses (evapo-transpiration).

An Aridity Index, or moisture input/losses ratio, is used to delimit different
climatic zones with respect to dryness (World Atlas of Desertification,
UNEP). In this schema, "arid, semi-arid and dry sub-humid areas", refers
to areas, other than polar and sub-polar regions, in which the ratio of
annual precipitation to potential evapo-transpiration is between 0.05 and
0.65 units (Article 1, UNCCD). These areas are also referred to as
"drylands".

Drylands cover forty percent of the world's land surface (about 5.1 billion
ha), and are the habitat and source of livelihood of more than 1 billion
people (World Atlas of Desertification, UNEP). Desertification affects
seventy percent of the world's drylands, amounting to 3.6 billion ha or one
fourth of the world's land surface (Down to Earth, UNCCD Secretariat).

Soil Degradation Severity


Source: UNEP, World Atlas of Desertification

Hyper-arid lands, those with an Aridity Index below 0.05 units, are deserts
and are therefore not considered susceptible drylands as indicated above,
because they have naturally very low biological productivity.

Dryness varies both in time and space due to variation in moisture inputs
and losses. The inherent natural dynamism of dryland ecosystems is very
largely governed by climatic fluctuations. Changes in storage (rivers,
groundwater, lakes and soil moisture) and in resource uses (food
production, cash crops, range farming, trees and woodlands) also affect
dryland boundaries.

Land includes soil and local water resources, land surface and vegetation,
including crops. Degradation implies reduction of resource productivity by
one or a combination of processes acting on the land.

Desertification
As indicated in the desertification Convention, "land degradation" means
reduction or loss, in arid, semi-arid and dry sub-humid areas, of the
biological or economic productivity and complexity of rainfed cropland,
irrigated cropland, or range, pasture, forest and woodlands resulting from
land uses or from a process or combination of processes, including
processes arising from human activities and habitation patterns, such as:

soil erosion caused by wind and/or water;
deterioration of the physical, chemical and biological or economic
properties of soil;
long-term loss of natural vegetation.
Soil is an integral part of most terrestrial ecosystems and serves a
fundamental function in supporting human communities. Soil degradation
is therefore an environmental issue of crucial concern to all societies.

Soil degradation, in particular, is defined as human-induced phenomena
which lower the current and/or future capacity of the soil to support human
life (GLASOD). In drylands, soils are especially vulnerable to degradation
due to the slowness of their recovery from a disturbance. It is recorded that
almost twenty percent of susceptible drylands experience soil degradation
(World Atlas of Desertification, UNEP).

Asia possesses the largest land area affected by desertification,
seventy-one percent of which is moderately to severely degraded. For
Latin America, this proportion is seventy-five percent. In Africa, two thirds
of which is desert or drylands, seventy-three percent of the agricultural
drylands are moderately to severely degraded (Down to Earth, UNCCD
Secretariat).

Africa, with a rate of disappearance of forest cover of 3.7 to 5 million ha
per year bearing down on both surface and groundwater resources and
with half the continent's farmland suffering from soil degradation and
erosion, is under the greatest desertification threat.
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What is Desertification
What is Desertification
What Is Desertification?
World of Development Experience
Put your ideas, experience and expertise to work.

At the United Nations Millennium Summit, the world's leaders
pledged to cut global poverty in half by 2015. The United Nations
Development Programme is charged with helping make this
happen. We want your help to do it.

As the UN's global development network, UNDP is at the forefront
of today's development dialogue in championing the poor and
disadvantaged. Our focus is on providing developing countries with
knowledge-based consulting services and building national,
regional and global coalitions for change. With a strong history of
inclusion and consensus-building, UNDP has earned the trust and
partnership of leaders across the developing world.

We are now hiring a new generation of expert practitioners who
want to contribute to those partnerships by offering strategic
approaches to long-standing problems. We seek individuals who
can communicate advice and new ideas across cultures and all
strata of society.

We have a wide range of international opportunities at various
levels; competitive salaries offered commensurate with experience.

For more information please click on the categories on the left.

For inquiries, please contact ohr.recruitment.hq@undp.org
Notice: UNDP is aware of fictitious vacancy announcements that
are being circulated through the Internet. If you believe that you have
received such a notice, please forward it, and any other related
information you have received, to scamalert@undp.org.
Use of terms

For the purposes of this Convention:

(a) "desertification" means land degradation in arid, semi-arid and dry
sub-humid areas resulting from various factors, including climatic variations
and human activities;

(b) "combating desertification" includes activities which are part of the
integrated development of land in arid, semi-arid and dry sub-humid areas for
sustainable development which are aimed at:

(i) prevention and/or reduction of land degradation;

(ii) rehabilitation of partly degraded land; and

(iii) reclamation of desertified land;

(c) "drought" means the naturally occurring phenomenon that exists when
precipitation has been significantly below normal recorded levels, causing
serious hydrological imbalances that adversely affect land resource production
systems;

(d) "mitigating the effects of drought" means activities related to the prediction
of drought and intended to reduce the vulnerability of society and natural
systems to drought as it relates to combating desertification;

(e) "land" means the terrestrial bio-productive system that comprises soil,
vegetation, other biota, and the ecological and hydrological processes that
operate within the system;

(f) "land degradation" means reduction or loss, in arid, semi-arid and dry
sub-humid areas, of the biological or economic productivity and complexity of
rainfed cropland, irrigated cropland, or range, pasture, forest and woodlands
resulting from land uses or from a process or combination of processes,
including processes arising from human activities and habitation patterns,
such as:

(i) soil erosion caused by wind and/or water;

(ii) deterioration of the physical, chemical and biological or economic
properties of soil; and

(iii) long-term loss of natural vegetation;

(g) "arid, semi-arid and dry sub-humid areas" means areas, other than polar
and sub-polar regions, in which the ratio of annual precipitation to potential
evapotranspiration falls within the range from 0.05 to 0.65;

(h) "affected areas" means arid, semi-arid and/or dry sub-humid areas
affected or threatened by desertification;

(i) "affected countries" means countries whose lands include, in whole or in
part, affected areas;

(j) "regional economic integration organization" means an organization
constituted by sovereign States of a given region which has competence in
respect of matters governed by this Convention and has been duly authorized,
in accordance with its internal procedures, to sign, ratify, accept, approve or
accede to this Convention;

(k) "developed country Parties" means developed country Parties and regional
economic integration organizations constituted by developed countries.

Desertification

Desertification is the degradation of land in arid, semi-arid, and dry
sub-humid areas. It is caused primarily by human activities and
climatic variations. Desertification does not refer to the expansion of
existing deserts. It occurs because dryland ecosystems, which cover
over one third of the world's land area, are extremely vulnerable to
over-exploitation and inappropriate land use. Poverty, political
instability, deforestation, overgrazing, and bad irrigation practices
can all undermine the land's fertility. Over 250 million people are
directly affected by desertification. In addition, some one thousand
million (or one billion) people in over one hundred countries are at
risk. These people include many of the world's poorest, most
marginalized, and politically weak citizens. (Source: The United
Nations Convention to Combat Desertification: An Explanatory
Leaflet).
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