These guidelines have been developed based on FAO’s and WOCAT’s extensive experience. The book draws, in particular, on WOCAT’s network and its database of SLM knowledge - as well as on WOC AT’s first overview book entitled ‘Where the land is greener’. These guidelines were implemented in the framework of the TerrAfrica partnership, whose main objective is to mainstream and upscale SLM in SSA, through the leveraging and harmonising of multisectoral investments at the local, country, subregional and regional levels.

Dryland mountains are among the least-known environments in the world, and certainly one of the most overlooked by decision- and policy-makers. Dryland mountains have an outstanding strategic value. They act as water towers for surrounding dry lowland areas, as shown by the examples of the Rocky Mountains of North America, the Central Andes, the mountains of the Mediterranean Basin, the Sahara and Sub-Saharan Africa, West Asia, and Central Asia

The report addresses a much debated issue – bioenergy and associated land use change, and how the climate change mitigation from use of bioenergy can be influenced by greenhouse gas emissions arising from land use change. The purpose of this background report is to supply a more detailed, fully referenced version for practitioners, and researchers, in support of the short version (IEA Bioenergy: ExCo:2010:03) which was aimed at policy advisors and policy makers.

Asia and the Pacific, for the purposes of this book, encompasses a vast territory extending from Mongolia in the north to New Zealand in the south; from the Cook Islands in the east to Kuwait in the west (Map 1). The environmental diversity of Asia and the Pacific is therefore vast, and is contrasted by the region’s coldest and hottest deserts, verdant tropical rainforests, extensive steppe, desert steppe, grassland and rangelands, mountains and plains.

In the past decades, debates on agriculture, land use and management of natural resources have coined a wealth of new terms. In many cases, these are in full vogue for just a period, replace older ones or are used for political reasons. Meanwhile, there are so many terms that it is difficult to keep track and distinguish them from each other.

The purpose of the present Law is to achieve the objectives and principles of federal and cantonal legislation in the field of land use planning and construction. The text consists of 127 articles divided into 8 Parts as follows: General provisions (1); Land use planning (2); Development (3); Land consolidation and boundary adjustment (4); Measures to promote the availability of land (5); Building regulations (6); Procedural provisions, administrative enforcement and penalties (7); Transitional and final provisions (8).

 All over Asia, small women and men farmers are experiencing extreme and intense weather events brought about by climate change. Almost all of them are caught unprepared by changing climate patterns: rains are heavier, storms and floods occur more often, dry seasons are more intense and last longer. They do not understand why this is happening. All they know is that they have to find a way to adapt to and survive these changes.

L’agriculture doit littéralement retourner à ses racines en redécouvrant l’importance de sols en bonne santé, en utilisant des sources naturelles de nutrition des plantes et en appliquant avec discernement les engrais minéraux.

In cooperation with the Government of Ethiopia, the Subregional Office of Eastern Africa (SFE) of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) introduced a parasitic wasp to control a fast-spreading aphid pest infestation threatening to destroy cypress tree plantations in parts of the Amhara and Tigray Regional States in the north of Ethiopia.

The Kagera Transboundary Agro ‐ ecosystem management project is a regional project comprising four East African countries ‐ Burundi, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda ‐ that share the Kagera river basin. The agro‐ecosystems in the Kagera basin are facing increasing pressure as a result of rapid population growth and agricultural and livestock intensification characterized by progressive reduction in farm sizes and unsustainable land use and management practices.

LADA (Land Degradation Assessment in Drylands project) is a scientifically-based approach to assessing and mapping land degradation at different spatial scales ? small to large ? and at various levels ? local to global. It was initiated in drylands, but the methods and tools have been developed so as to be widely applicable in other ecosystems and diverse contexts with minimal required adaptation.