Restoring rangelands and desert landscapes is central to food security, livelihoods and resilient rural economies, FAO Deputy Director-General Beth Bechdol told the 17th Conference of the Parties to the UN Convention to Combat Desertification in Ulaanbaatar.

Her argument rests on a single arithmetic point. Around 60 percent of the 1.66 billion hectares degraded by unsustainable land use is agricultural land, including cropland and pasture. Reversing just 10 percent of that degradation, according to FAO, could feed an additional 154 million people every year.

Speaking at the launch of the Rangelands Flagship Initiative, which aims to lift investment towards Land Degradation Neutrality, Bechdol pressed a distinction that matters to any livestock keeper. "Restoration cannot simply mean making degraded land green again. What grows matters," she said. "The diversity and quality of grasses, forage and other vegetation matter — for livestock, for biodiversity and for the long-term productivity and health of these ecosystems."

She also insisted that pastoralists be recognised as partners, leaders and decision-makers in the management and restoration of rangelands rather than as recipients of a plan made elsewhere. FAO welcomed the initiative's three pillars: a shared knowledge agenda, an investment platform to mobilise public and private finance, and a Coalition on Rangelands and Pastoralists.

FAO has led the International Year of Rangelands and Pastoralists 2026, which Bechdol said has generated real visibility and momentum — momentum that now has to turn into investment and partnerships that deliver results for rangeland ecosystems and pastoral communities.

Earlier the same day the Deputy Director-General joined a side event on restoring African landscapes, in particular on scaling up the Great Green Wall across the Sahel, which FAO has supported with work on the ground since 2007.

She highlighted FAO's leadership of Open DEAL — Data for Environment, Agriculture and Land — the first continental-scale biophysical baseline assessment of land use in Africa. It assessed more than 300,000 sampling points using very high-resolution satellite imagery and identified 162 million hectares of degraded land in the Sahel Great Green Wall area that need restoration. FAO is now working with partners, including the Pan-African Agency of the Great Green Wall, on an integrated monitoring and reporting system whose information is open to all.

Delivery ultimately depends on finance, Bechdol said, but a great deal of technical de-risking can be done before any funding decision is made. FAO's role, in her words, "is to help create the conditions that make capital more likely to move — and more likely to succeed once it does."

Source: FAO Newsroom