Restoring Degraded Landscapes blog posts

On World Soil Day, we argue that healthy and productive soils should be at the center of solutions targeting food system transformation, climate action and ecosystem restoration.

The Coalition of Action 4 Soil Health – or Global Soil Hub – has been inspired by the UN Food Systems Summit and brings together countries, research organizations, farmers, the private sector and others to improve soil health.

Scientists say organic carbon and nitrogen not changed following long-term prescribed burning and livestock exclusion in the Sudan savanna woodlands of Burkina Faso and the Ethiopian rangelands.

Scientists warn that restoration action is at risk of failure if it doesn't address social and political considerations.

A new special issue of the journal Ecological Restoration stresses that social inclusion must be at the heart of the ecological restoration agenda, and not just on the periphery.

Decision dashboards are poised to bridge the gap between data and policy, with consolidated and accessible information systems enabling evidence-based decision-making.

A comprehensive approach to monitoring soil health, implemented by ICRAF with support from WLE, combines physical and chemical analyses with above-ground indicators like tree and shrub biodiversity. Its application across vast landscapes is transforming rehabilitation efforts worldwide.

Post-drought dynamics of plant communities show potential trigger of a vicious-cycle of more intense droughts and increasing global vulnerability of forests.

These lessons will help avoid the "one-size-fits" pitfall in achieving a sustainable agricultural transformation agenda at the national level, and at the grass-root level in making meaningful recommendations to farmers for better yields.

The six year project demonstrated immediate results of contour bunding and benefitted more than 2,500 farmers across the two study sites.

The WLE FG5 team aims to use text mining as an effective means of drawing attention to progress as well as identifying critical gaps, as in the case of gender based issues.

New technology can help us quickly and cheaply diagnose soil health troubles – where, what and why – and set us on the path toward successful treatment.