The World Day to Combat Desertification is an annual event to reduce land degradation

The World Day to Combat Desertification is an annual event to reduce land degradation
17 June 2021

Mahmiyat.ps website considered the World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought, which is on June the 17th of each year, as an annual opportunity to reduce land degradation and restore it in the Arab region and prioritize its health in recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Mahmiyat.ps noted that the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) announced this year the theme of "Restoration.Land.Recovery: We build back better with healthy land."," which aims to advance actions towards protecting and restoring natural ecosystems as we recover from the Covid pandemic. 19.

Mahmiyat.ps indicated that deforestation, overgrazing and wrong behaviors negatively affect the productivity of the land, the sites and natural reserves, which means their deterioration and transformation increases gas emissions and decreases biodiversity.

The biodiversity helps to recover the climate through the absorption of carbon, whose sequestration leads slowing the pace of climate change; In turn, it is pushing towards green recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic, noting that the Mahmiyat.ps projects, with the support of the Hanns Seidel Foundation, has contributed through its activities and interventions in the environmental sector with the competent authorities and the local community in limiting the deterioration of ecosystems by launching several initiatives in sites and nature reserves in Palestine.

Desertification is defined as the degradation of land in arid, semi-arid and dry sub-humid areas. It is primarily caused by human activities and climate change. Desertification does not refer to the expansion of existing deserts. This happens because dryland ecosystems, which cover more than a third of the world's land area, are highly vulnerable to overexploitation and inappropriate land use.