Global Community

𝑾𝒐𝒎𝒆𝒏, 𝑲𝒆𝒚 𝑨𝒍𝒍𝒊𝒆𝒔 𝒊𝒏 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝑭𝒊𝒈𝒉𝒕 𝑨𝒈𝒂𝒊𝒏𝒔𝒕 𝑫𝒆𝒔𝒆𝒓𝒕𝒊𝒇𝒊𝒄𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏 𝒊𝒏 𝑨𝒇𝒓𝒊𝒄𝒂

Desertification affects a large part of Africa and threatens food security, water resources, and the livelihoods of millions of people. Yet, at the heart of this struggle, one essential actor stands out : women.

𝑮𝒖𝒂𝒓𝒅𝒊𝒂𝒏𝒔 𝒐𝒇 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒍𝒂𝒏𝒅
In Africa, women produce up to 70% of local food. They cultivate, fetch water, preserve seeds, and know the soil better than anyone. This close relationship with nature places them on the front lines against the effects of drought and land degradation.

𝑪𝒐𝒏𝒄𝒓𝒆𝒕𝒆 𝒔𝒐𝒍𝒖𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏𝒔
Across the continent, women-led initiatives are transforming the fight against desertification:
• tree planting and agroforestry,
• farming techniques that retain water and restore soils,
• transforming invasive plants into organic compost, biochar, and biogas,
• turning local plants into income sources (honey, moringa, soap).
These actions revive the land and ensure the food security of communities.

𝑶𝒃𝒔𝒕𝒂𝒄𝒍𝒆𝒔 𝒕𝒐 𝒐𝒗𝒆𝒓𝒄𝒐𝒎𝒆
Despite their central role, women rarely own the land they cultivate (less than 20% in sub-Saharan Africa). They also have less access to finance and training.

𝑾𝒉𝒚 𝒊𝒏𝒗𝒆𝒔𝒕 𝒊𝒏 𝒘𝒐𝒎𝒆𝒏?
Studies show that giving women the same land rights and resources as men could reduce global hunger by 12 to 17% (FAO and Action Against Hunger). This demonstrates how crucial their involvement is for a sustainable future.

In conclusion, women are pillars of resilience in the fight against desertification. By granting them more resources, rights, and recognition, we not only strengthen the battle against land degradation but also promote social justice and safeguard the future of generations to come.

How Smart Tech Is Helping Catch Precious Water That’s Flowing Away

Imagine a huge pipe network under your city, carrying water to people’s homes. Now picture one-third of that water (enough to fill thousands of swimming pools) just vanishing into leaks, theft, or bad bills every year. Fixing leaks with traditional methods can feel like searching for a needle in a haystack. It’s costly, slow, and often misses hidden issues. Even worse, analyzing data by hand is error-prone and overly complex for many teams to manage (UNDP).

📖 You can read more and join the discussion in the Community at the UNCCD CLP platform:
👉 https://lnkd.in/egPbpgBF

Here’s where smart, data-powered tools come in (think of them as super-sleuth gadgets for water systems). Two technologies team up to make this happen:

1. Internet of Things (IoT), which is like putting tiny, connected sensors (smart meters) across the water pipes, watching how much flows and how fast, around the clock.
2. Artificial Intelligence (AI) that is like teaching a computer to spot unusual patterns—such as pressure dropping in the middle of the night or flow spiking in one spot.

Together, these tools turn data into clues. They help water teams find trouble spots quickly and accurately (without sending field crews everywhere).

UNDP’s Accelerator Lab worked with the startup FlowLess to test this smart system, so it was much cheaper than expensive foreign alternatives and adapted to different local water networks and needs, and the team remained open to feedback and improvements.
📖 You can read more and join the discussion in the Community at the UNCCD CLP platform:
👉 https://lnkd.in/egPbpgBF
Read more:
👉https://lnkd.in/e3h_E-gh
👉https://lnkd.in/eYcKxv4P).

🌬️ Join Us for the UNCCD CLP Learning Exchange on Combating Sand and Dust Storms 🌍
🗓️ Date: July 15, 2025
🕙 Time: 10:00–11:00 (CET)
📍 Virtual Event (Zoom)
🔗 Register here: https://lnkd.in/djpW_xKC

To mark the International Day of Combating Sand and Dust Storms, the UNCCD Global Communities for Learning and Practice (UNCCD-CLP) is organizing a special Learning Exchange webinar focused on the serious environmental, health, and socioeconomic challenges posed by Sand and Dust Storms (SDS) — and what we can do to address them.
🔍 What to Expect:
Presentations by two distinguished international experts
Insights on SDS source mapping, impact assessment, and mitigation strategies
An interactive Q&A session to foster dialogue and knowledge-sharing

🎤 Featured Speakers:

Prof. Ali Darvishi Boloorani, University of Tehran & UNCCD-CLP Co-Chair – Dust Source Mapping & Mitigation Strategies

Prof. Peter Tozer, Massey University – Impact Assessment: Environmental, Health, and Economic Perspectives

✅ Expected Outcomes:
Enhanced understanding of SDS and its connection to drought and land degradation
Strengthened collaboration among experts, practitioners, and policymakers
Actionable recommendations for SDS-related policy and program development

This session is ideal for professionals and practitioners working in:
🏜️ Sand and Dust Storms
🌾 Drought resilience
🛰️ Early warning systems
🌍 Sustainable land management

📩 Register now via the link above and feel free to reach out for more details. We look forward to your participation!

Dear All,

I am pleased to share my paper published in NHESS Journal (An evaluation of the alignment of drought policy and planning guidelines with the contemporary disaster risk reduction agenda, Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 2155–2178, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-25-2155-2025, 2025)! You can freely download the paper at the journal website: https://nhess.copernicus.org/articles/25/2155/2025/

This study evaluates 12 sets of drought policy and planning guidelines for their alignment with the four priority areas of the SENDAI framework. The guidelines do not align very well with the contemporary disaster risk reduction agenda. The study highlights strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats and provides useful insights to develop the next generation of drought guidelines that are better aligned with contemporary science–policy–practice agendas.

Hopefully this work will contribute to supporting the accelerated transition towards improved drought risk reduction and management and building the resilience of societies and ecosystems to droughts under changing climate and increasing anthropogenic pressures.

I am happy to discuss this work if you have any questions or would like to collaborate.

Kind regards,
Ilyas Masih

Combating Desertification in Africa : Zainer’s Contribution to SDG 15 (Life on Land)

Zainer is a low-cost machine for climate resilient agriculture in arid and semi-arid regions.

The Zainer is a vertical soil drill, mounted on a two wheeled cart and powered by a small 5hp petrol engine. Excavated soil is deposited on the down-stream side of the Zaï pit to make sure that run-off water from the field is directed into the pit for local infiltration. The design of the Zainer has been optimized for fuel efficiency and drilling speed to minimize the operational costs for the farmer.
Operating the Zainer can be comfortably done by both female and male farmers. Depending on the soil conditions, farmers are able to produce up to 17 Zaï plantholes per minute and 1 ha of land can be prepared within 5 days (compared to 300 hours of labor for manual Zaï). The drill bit can easily be replaced and be adapted to different soil conditions and desired plant hole dimensions.
Due to climate change, rainfall patterns in Africa have become less predictable. As a result, African farmers are experiencing production losses for their main rainfed crops. This climate instability, combined with increasing land degradation linked to desertification, poses a serious risk to food security and family incomes, particularly for smallholder farmers.
Indigenous conservation and regenerative agriculture practices can largely mitigate these risks and help combat desertification, but farmers consider these traditional practices too labor-intensive and economically unviable.
Affordable mechanization of climate-smart agricultural practices can overcome these drawbacks. An organization called Practica has therefore initiated the development of a simple tool to quickly and inexpensively produce small basins or pits for local rainwater retention. This tool is called "Zaïner," in reference to the traditional West African practice of creating small planting holes, called Zaï.
This innovative tool aims to strengthen the resilience of soils and farmers in the face of desertification and climate change.

The man who stopped the desert : Yacouba Sawadogo

“For turning barren land into forest and demonstrating how farmers can regenerate their soil with innovative use of indigenous and local knowledge.”

Yacouba Sawadogo (1946-2023) was known as “the man who stopped the desert”. Starting around 1980 during a phase of severe drought, he successfully created an almost 40-hectare forest on formerly barren and abandoned land. Today, it has more than 60 species of trees and bushes and is arguably one of the most diverse forests planted and managed by a farmer in the Sahel.

Sawadogo’s remarkable success builds on experimenting with traditional planting pits for soil, water and biomass retention, called “zaï” in the local language. He continued innovating the technique over the years, increasing crop yields and successfully planting trees. Despite facing resistance from locals in the beginning – Sawadogo was called a “madman” and saw his forest set on fire – he never considered giving up. Over time, people came to admire his work.

Always eager to share his knowledge, Sawadogo trained thousands of visitors from the region and beyond, and empowered farmers to regenerate their land. As a result, tens of thousands of hectares of degraded land have been restored to productivity in Burkina Faso and Niger. Those who adopt Sawadogo’s techniques often become food secure, as zaï help to conserve rainwater and improve soil fertility. Trees planted together with the crops serve to enrich the soil, produce fodder for livestock and create business opportunities like beekeeping. This helps farmers adapt to climate change, reduce rural poverty and prevent local resource and water-related conflicts.

Dear CLP members,
It is a great pleasure and honour for me to be part of this diverse global community as a co-chair. I am looking forward to working with you to contribute towards our shared goals of addressing droughts, reversing desertification and building resilience against disasters across the globe.
In this message, let me briefly introduce myself. I am working as an Associate Professor of Water Resources planning at IHE Delft Institute for Water Education, Delft the Netherlands. My educational background is multi-disciplinary, with a PhD degree in hydrology and water resource, MPhil in Water Resources Management and BSc in Agricultural Engineering. I have about 25 years of professional experience on a wide range of hydrology, water management and disaster risk issues across several countries in Asia, Africa, Europe and Latin America. I am deeply committed to contribute to address global water, land and drought related challenges. I am passionate to bridge the science-policy-practice gaps, and enjoy working with transdisciplinary actors from these arenas. I am actively participating in various drought and water management related networks including IAHS network on Drought in the Anthropocene and UN-Water SDG6 Capacity Development Initiative.

At DiTA network, I am coordinating a webinar series on bridging the science-policy-practice gap. Taking this opportunity, I warmly invite you to the upcoming webinar planned on 26th June (see flyer).

Looking forward to working with you to drive the positive change!
Yours sincerely,
Ilyas Masih