Male, Maldives (CU)_ Abdulla Shahid, President of the 76th session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), has urged recommitment to the 2030 target of eliminating land degradation. In his speech on the international day to prevent desertification and drought, PGA Shahid stressed that people must realize that their actions and lifestyles have dire effects on lands.
PGA Shahid predicted that by 2050, droughts might impact more than 75 percent of the world’s population, highlighting that droughts had already affected at least 2.7 billion people worldwide and caused 11.7 million fatalities over a century. PGA Shahid emphasized that this is happening because the globe continues to degrade the land upon which people depend, noting that 23 percent of the world’s soil is no longer productive and 75 percent has been altered from its original condition, primarily for agriculture.
The PGA claimed that this may be reversed by collaborative efforts, noting that desertification has far-reaching effects on everything from biodiversity, ecological security, and the elimination of poverty to socioeconomic stability and sustainable development. Accordingly, he stated that global communities can work together to resume the productivity of more than two billion hectares of degraded land and enhance the livelihoods of over 1.3 billion people worldwide.
Abdulla Shahid from PGA said, “I had the honor to attend the recent COP15 on desertification, land degradation and drought in Abidjan, organized by the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification and the government of Côte d’Ivoire. I was encouraged to hear policymakers acknowledge the serious nature of desertification and to propose concrete solutions to move forward from the Great Green Wall to the Abidjan call”.
According to the PGA, such measures may assist in overcoming some of the greatest challenges to our fast degrading environment. He also noted that he had the chance to watch action in Angola, where thousands of people stand to gain from better water at the Cunene River. Noting that such initiatives offer him hope, the PGA asked the public to build on these examples, accept the UNCCD COP15 pledges, and recommit to achieving land degradation neutrality by 2030.
