21 July 2009: The Secretariat of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) has prepared a report on the “Land Day” event it sponsored on 6 June 2009, in Bonn, Germany.

The event, which convened concurrently with the June Bonn Climate Change Conference, sought to: examine the strong linkage among desertification, land degradation and drought (DLDD) and climate change so that soil/land potential in addressing climate change is included in the negotiation process; explore how best to bring the carbon economy to local and low income natural resources end-users; increase knowledge on the nexus between climate change adaptation, drought mitigation and the restoration of degraded lands; and raise the profile of DLDD, especially by stressing its linkage to climate change.
In his closing statement, UNCCD Executive Secretary Luc Gnacadja stressed the need to include sustainable agriculture in the new climate change regime and suggested that a comprehensive study on the economics of land degradation and sustainable land management should be carried out to demonstrate how sustainable land management fits into the macroeconomic framework. [Land Day report]