“Desertification is a phenomenon that ranks among the greatest environmental challenges of our time. Yet most people haven't heard of it or don’t understand it”.

- United Nations

Desertification is defined as the persistent degradation of land ecosystems by human activities such as unsustainable farming, mining, overgrazing, cutting down forests, and climate change.

The world's deserts are growing

Drought has been labelled “the silent killer”. Each year, an area of fertile soil the size of New Mexico or Poland is swallowed by desserts and made useless for farming. Often in areas where people are already starving. Growing deserts are threatening an area larger than the combined area of the US, India, China and Russia (40 million square kilometers).

By 2025, 1.8 billion people will experience absolute water scarcity, and 2/3 of the world will be living under water-stressed conditions.

By 2045, 135 million people could be displaced as a result of desertification.

Over 75% of the Earth's land area is already degraded, and over 90% could become degraded by 2050.

Benefits of restoring degraded ecosystems

Restoring the soils of degraded ecosystems has the potential to store up to 3 billion tons of carbon annually.

The land use sector represents almost 25% of total global emissions. Its rehabilitation and sustainable management is critical to combating climate change.

Land degradation and climate change are estimated to lead to a reduction of global crop yields by about 10% by 2050. Most of this will occur in India, China and sub-Saharan Africa, where land degradation could halve crop production.

At the same time the world population is growing.

Future consequences of land degradation

It will be a huge challenge to secure food for everyone when our lands for farming are degrading, or disappearing, and the world's population is growing by 200,000 people every day…

By 2050, the world population has reached 10 billion people. And will continue to grow towards 11 billion before the end of the century.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), 815 million people already experience chronic food-insecurity. An additional 3 billion people combined with less crop yield will not exactly reduce this problem.

Food production needs to increase by 50% by 2050 to feed the world population.

Lack of water a major global issue

By 2025, an estimated 1.8 billion people will experience absolute water scarcity.  

2/3 of the world population will be living under water-stressed conditions.

By 2050, the demand for water is expected to increase by 50 per cent.

We are responsible for it

The main reasons why deserts are growing are climate change and human activities such as over-intensive farming, poor irrigation and clearing of forests.

Main causes of desertification

Overgrazing and improper farming practices: Sometimes farming is done without the knowledge of how to use the land effectively. In the worst cases, the land is sucked dry and then abandoned before the farming activities are moved to another piece of land thereby slowly turning fertile land into desert. Animal grazing can contribute to land degradation and desertification too if not managed responsibly.

Deforestation: The cutting down of forests to make room for cattle or farming contribute to desertification as forests play a key role in the water and nutrient balance of lands.

Mining: The environmental costs of large-scale mining are significant. Over 60 billion tons of metal ores, fossil energy, and non-metallic minerals are extracted from Earth a year. As mining activities spread it adds to land degradation and desertification - also because of the heavy pollution often associated with mining activities.

Urbanization and land development: Urbanization takes up land for natural habitat and puts pressure on remaining ecosystems due to pollution, water use etc.

Climate Change: Climate change plays a major role in desertification as periods of drought become more frequent. If global warming is not slowed down, huge areas of land will degrade and eventually turn into desert.

Africa is severely affected by the loss of fertile land

According to the United Nations, desertification is potentially the most threatening ecosystem change impacting livelihoods of the poor. In Africa alone, 36 countries are affected by desertification or land degradation. Some estimate that 75 percent of the entire continent’s farmland is rapidly losing the basic nutrients needed to grow crops.

Huge benefits of reversing the development

The economic costs of desertification and land degradation are estimated at up to 15 trillion dollars.