Discussion Forums

Sustainable landscape restoration requires a recognition of the rights and responsibilities of the peoples who live and work within them.  Bringing together indigenous peoples, researchers and practitioners, this session looks at landscapes through the prism of a rights-based perspective. The session will engage with the issues facing communities in law and in practice and explore pathways forward.  Without losing sight of the global context and initiatives such as REDD and FLR, the speakers will focus on concrete mechanisms for securing the position of households, women and historically marginalized communities through measures ranging from land titling to social safeguards.

Resources

Rights abuse allegations in the context of REDD+ readiness and implementation: A preliminary review and proposal for moving forward

Securing Community Land Rights: Priorities & Opportunities to Advance Climate & Sustainable Development Goals

Presentations (PDF): Andy White

Sustainable Development Goal 15 formulates an ambitious vision for the landscapes of the future: a land degradation neutral world in 2030. In this event we will discuss why Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) is not only another target but a framework by which we can leverage existing commitments to sustainably manage our working landscapes. A key challenge for the implementation of LDN and FLR commitments is land governance. Panelists and audience will explore how the governance of tenure, access, and use of land and soils is critical for the success or failure of all restoration initiatives.

For more information on the topics of discussion, please see:

• Global Land Outlook
• Achieving Land Degradation Neutrality at the country level
• Scientific conceptual framework for land degradation neutrality
• Global Soil Week
• Land Rehabilitation through reforestation – the power of property rights
• Soil Protection Fact Sheet
• Land Degradation Neutrality– A new impetus to address the global challenge of land and soil degradation
• Gender factor in achieving Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN)
• Sustainable Land Management for Climate and people – Policy Brief
• Land in Balance – Policy Brief
• Land Degradation Neutrality Transformative actions, tapping opportunities
• Great Green Wall Africa
• LDN Fund brochure
• Video – Land and SDG 15 

Session Description
Commitments to address land degradation have been made at different levels, through the SDGs, the UNCCD framework, the UNFCCC, the GPFLR, AFR 100 and LAC20x20, among others. These ongoing efforts help to address the recurring crisis in the drylands, but the challenge is to ensure that the solution they provide is not only temporary.

Permanently reducing the vulnerability of the people living in drylands will require sustained efforts to attack the underlying causes of the problem. If current trends continue, higher population density, combined with increasing interest from outside investors in large scale commercial agriculture and extractive industries, will put additional pressure on the fragile natural resources base of drylands, pushing it in some cases beyond its regenerative capacity.

As competition for resources intensifies, conflicts over land, water, feed, are likely to multiply, reducing the ability of governments, development agencies, and local communities to manage the impact of the many shocks.  The potential development impacts, including in terms of resilience, growth, stability and migrations, vs. the cost of too little action, call for efforts to be transformative and to be expanded at landscape scale.

Key ingredients of such efforts deal with implementation of large programs involving different sectors, engaging private sector, scaling up financing, and promoting capacity building and knowledge exchanges. These also require taking improved collaborations to take advantage of the respective contributions of different stakeholders and institutions for integrated landscape approaches. In that perspective, the World Bank can, along with partners, further mobilize its capacity and experience to support countries to fight land degradation and increase resilience.

Session Objectives

This moderated panel discussion organized by the Word Bank Group and partners will:

• stress the need for large scale, integrated action for impactful results;
• draw on lessons to identify key ingredients for success;
• identify opportunities and requirements for transformative change;
• highlight the role of the World Bank Group and partners in supporting countries drive transformative actions.

 Session Format

This will be a 90-minute moderated panel discussion.