December 2015: A US$1 investment in the restoration of degraded land returns US$5, a study published by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) highlights. The book, titled ‘Economics of land degradation and improvement: A global assessment for sustainable development,’ notes that the annual global cost of land degradation due to land use and cover change (LUCC) and lower cropland and rangeland productivity is estimated to be about US$300 billion, with Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) accounting for the largest share (22%) of the total global cost of land degradation.

Only about 38% of the cost of land degradation due to LUCC, which accounts for 78% of the USD$300 billion loss, is borne by land users, the authors explain, and the remaining share (62%) is borne by consumers of ecosystem services off the farm.

The book notes that land degradation is stretching to about 30% of the total global land area, with about three billion people residing in these degraded lands. The impact of land degradation is especially severe on the livelihoods of the poor who heavily depend on natural resources. The findings of country case studies call for increased investments into the rehabilitation and restoration of degraded lands, including through such institutional and policy measures as strengthening community participation for sustainable land management, enhancing government effectiveness and rule of law, improving access to markets and rural services, and securing land tenure.

The book is structured over 21 chapters, which cover: an introductory overview; concepts and methods of global assessment of the economics of land degradation and improvement; an institutional framework of action against land degradation; biomass productivity-based mapping of global land degradation hotspots; evaluating global land degradation using ground-based measurements and remote sensing; the global cost of land degradation; global drivers of land degradation and improvement; global estimates of the impacts of grassland degradation on livestock productivity; and the economics of land degradation in Sub-Saharan Africa, Central Asia, Argentina, Bhutan, China, Ethiopia, India, Kenya, Niger, the Russian Federation, Senegal, Tanzania, Malawi, and Uzbekistan.

With regard to conservation, empirical evidence has shown, the authors explain, that involvement of local communities in managing forests and other high value biomes and creating mechanisms for them to directly benefit from their conservation efforts is more effective protection than centralized protection. [Publication: Economics of land degradation and improvement: A global assessment for sustainable development]