
What we do
Land degradation, desertification and drought are significant and growing barriers to sustainable development as the impacts of climate change and environmental degradation impact human health, productivity and resilience for billions of people. The Nairobi-based Global Policy Centre on Resilient Ecosystems and Desertification (GC-RED) focuses on strengthening the linkages between environmental sustainability and human development and resilience, and particularly contributes to improving the sustainable management of natural capital (biodiversity, land and ecosystem services) in support of expanded employment and livelihoods opportunities. It also contributes to UNDP’s resilience agenda based on the long track record of the Centre in drylands/drought resilience.
Key statistics
12M
hectares are lost each year
50-700M
people projected to have migrated as a result
20%
Earth's vegetated surface degraded
40%
of world's degraded land located in high incidence of poverty