2004-05 : The Gambia - Commmunity Garden Project of the Belgian Hands Together Association (Photo Helena CLYBOUW)
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Read at : Google Alert – desertification
http://allafrica.com/stories/201103290797.html
Nigeria: UN Agency Says Combating Desertification is a Must
Laide Akinboade
29 March 2011
Executive Secretary, UN Convention to Combat Desertification, Mr. Luc Gnacadja, said it is imperative for all nations in the world to intensify efforts in combating desertification.
Luc Gnacadja, stated this in a message he read at the commemoration of the World Meteorological Day, said over 2 billion people all over the world are living on dry land are faced with the scourge of desertification.
According to the Executive Secretary, “Climate for You,” which is the theme for 2011 World Meteorological Day, is a thought- provoking idea for the nearly 2 billion people living in the drylands. For a majority, it means an enduring struggle to combat land degradation, commonly known as desertification. And what in the past also entailed overcoming the impacts of drought from time-to-time is now become a recurrent challenge not only in frequency, but in scope and intensity as well.
Three decades ago, scientists raised the climate change alarm, warning that short of changing our consumption patterns, the intricate feedbacks between land, water and the climate would have significant impacts on the ecosystem and livelihoods, particularly in the drylands. At the ecosystem level, heavy precipitation events would lead to soil erosion. Droughts would be frequent, intensive and extensive, and the exposed soil would become infertile. Land degradation would follow, and then decreased land productivity. All these we have witnessed, most recently in Australia , Guatemala , Niger , Pakistan , Russia and the United States . Whether these are due to climate change may be debatable, but two things are certain. First, these developments occurred during and following the warmest decade on record and when the Earth had grown warmer over five decades.”
He noted that, it is not only the poor people in the world that are affected, the rich are also affected.
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