The Economics of Desertification, Land Degradation, and Drought

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lowest in the region. From a socioeconomic perspective, the NDVI is an indicator that is dissociated from people and their social and economic relations: It assesses degradation in remote, unpopulated places equally to NDVI-based degradation that destroys livelihoods in other areas. For this reason, NDVI studies have so far had little policy impacts. These and other shortcomings underscore the need to better calibrate the satellite data to address their shortcomings. For example, there is a need to establish sentinel study sites, 71 where indepth analysis can be done to better understand and calibrate the relationship between remotely sensed biophysical and socioeconomic data with the actual land degradation or improvement. Additional data that cannot be collected using satellite imagery could also be collected from the sentinel sites—in particular, socioeconomic data to indicate the human relevance of the land degradation indicators. The results from the sentinel sites could then be extrapolated to the global level. Understanding the Underlying Causes of land degradation will Help in the Design of Appropriate Actions for Preventing or Mitigating Land Degradation This review showed that understanding the underlying causes of land degradation is important for designing strategies for taking action to prevent or mitigate land degradation. The study also showed that the impact of one particular underlying cause of land degradation depends on the other underlying causes. For example, population density could lead to more severe land degradation if there are no strong institutions to regulate the behavior of communities or if market forces do not give land users an incentive to invest in land improvement. This situation suggests that taking action to prevent or mitigate land degradation requires the design of policies and strategies that will simultaneously address the multiple underlying causes of land degradation. Of particular importance is the need to develop strong local institutions for land management at the community level and to provide incentives for individual land users to invest in land improvement. This task requires decentralization policies, which provide mandates and which facilitate the development of local institutions. Studies have shown that countries that have been investing in land improvement and providing incentives to land users have seen greater improvement, despite their high population densities. For example, China has provided incentives for farmers in the western highlands to plant trees, and the Bai et al. (2008b) study showed a significant improvement of vegetation there. India’s decentralized government also allows communities to form communitybased watershed management (CBWM) committees. For instance, a switch from centrally managed watershed to CBWM in Tamil Nadu, India, in 2009) resulted in the water table receding and water availability increasing in the area. This significant change was largely due to the mandate given to local communities to manage and benefit from the watershed. Similar success stories have been observed by the International Forest Research Institute, which has been conducting research on community-based forest management in developing countries (Gibson, Williams, and Ostrom 2005). Taking Action to Prevent or Mitigate Land Degradation Requires an Economic Analysis of the Costs of Land Degradation and the Costs and Benefits of Preventing or Mitigating Land Degradation The economic analysis proposed in this study is the well-established concept of measuring the economic costs and benefits using total economic value of terrestrial ecosystem services, which comprise the on-site and off-site direct and indirect costs and benefits. Because both land degradation and action to prevent it have lagged effects, it is necessary to use dynamic modeling to determine the future costs and benefits, which requires long-term data collection and simulation analysis using wellcalibrated models. To analyze off-site costs and benefits requires an association of the benefits to the beneficiaries and of the costs to those who experience the negative impacts or implement the land conservation action. Such an analysis will, for instance, enable payment for ecosystem services (PES) 71 Sentinel sites are selected for an in-depth study or data collection such that the sentinel sites are representative of a larger area or population. Results from the sentinel sites could then be interpolated to the larger area or population they represent. 130
schemes to enhance the adoption of land management practices that would otherwise not be profitable if land users were not compensated for their actions. Local, national, and international cooperation is required to ensure such collaboration. Case studies from selected countries showed that the cost of preventing or mitigating land degradation is much less than the cost of land degradation. However, public investments in addressing land degradation in developing countries have been quite limited. One reason for such limited investment is the limited number of studies on the economics of land degradation. The global E- DLDD assessment proposed in this study will close this gap at the global level. Furthermore, the proposed country-level studies are required to inform the national-level policymakers so they can take action to address land degradation. To implement the global E-DLDD assessment, a well-planned organizational arrangement is required to coordinate and harmonize resources, ensure mobilization and advocacy, and conduct the necessary research in multidisciplinary and transregional teams. A large number of institutions have already produced a number of studies in the past, and a global E-DLDD initiative should take advantage of these by building on their strengths and using the data collected. For instance, a number of institutions have been collecting biophysical data on DLDD; however, collection of socioeconomic data is still limited. The new partnership should work hard to address the weaknesses of the current data, while nonetheless making use of the large amount of data freely shared by many publicly funded institutions. Is this Partnership Possible, And What Should Be Done To Build A Global E-DLDD Platform For Action? The current increased awareness of land degradation and the growing interest in investing in land provide a great potential for mobilizing partnership around a global E-DLDD assessment and, later, for implementing its recommendations. This would require champions of the cause to coordinate and facilitate action in both the policy and scientific spheres. It would also require experienced advocacy for mobilizing resources for a global E-DLDD assessment and its implementation. We have proposed an institutional setup to that effect, in which all stakeholders of a global E-DLDD initiative can meet and interact for the benefits of global action and investment against land degradation and drought and their effects on human welfare. An open consultation process across all the different groups of the institutional setup would be a worthy initial phase and a continuation of the dialogue process of which this study was a part. 131
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IFPRI Discussion Paper 01086 May 20
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Contents Abstract vii Acknowledgmen
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List of Figures 1.1—Conceptual fr
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ABSTRACT Attention to land degradat
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ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS ADB Asia
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SCAR Soil Conservation in Agricultu
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In the present report, the conceptu
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Framework: Confronting Action versu
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understand these arrangements in or
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Figure 1.3—Prevention, mitigation
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on assessments at the micro level (
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does not clearly distinguish betwee
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Figure 2.1—GLASOD (1991) global a
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International Earth Science Informa
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Box 2.1—Continued Normalized Diff
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Figure 2.4—Loss of annual NPP, GL
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Figure 2.7—Annual loss of NPP in
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Table 2.2—Nitrogen application ra
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Figure 2.12—Areas affected by hum
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output—which is a selection of su
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GLADIS also underlines the linkage
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Box 2.2—Continued A map on global
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Table 2.3—Global land degradation
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Table 2.3—Continued Project and d
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Table 2.4—Continued Location 10 2
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Table 2.6—Extent and severity of
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National Level Policies As discusse
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Such support has also been directed
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Migration, either as outmigration o
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The preceding discussion shows the
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Results Correlation Analysis Consis
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Figure 2.23—Relationship between
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Effects of Land Degradation On-Site
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soils and higher land productivity.
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Acknowledging the work of GLADIS, a
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health, education, security, enviro
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Box 3.1—Recent major economic ass
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An appropriate economic tool for a
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Figure 3.4—Cost of action and cos
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enefit—for example, income. This
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Figure 3.6—Ecosystem services fra
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Replacement Cost Approaches The rep
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Box 3.2—Measuring land degradatio
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land degradation and conservation m
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Flooding and Aquifer Recharge Richa
Page 92 and 93: year (Diao and Sarpong 2007). Sonne
Page 94 and 95: Bringing together the different cos
Page 96 and 97: This section discusses the most imp
Page 98 and 99: governing land use patterns (Leeman
Page 100 and 101: promotion of community forest manag
Page 102 and 103: Box 4.3—Reducing emissions from d
Page 104 and 105: Soil Nutrient Depletion Soil nutrie
Page 106 and 107: that the yields of salt-tolerant wh
Page 108 and 109: Figure 5.3—Forest area as a perce
Page 110 and 111: Figure 5.5—Per capita water stora
Page 112 and 113: Introduction 6. CASE STUDIES Five c
Page 114 and 115: Salinity The effects of salinity on
Page 116 and 117: Third, to correctly decide which ac
Page 118 and 119: Costs of Action and Inaction We eva
Page 120 and 121: The NGOs and religious organization
Page 122 and 123: have a strong influence on NRM (And
Page 124 and 125: We estimated the cost of action (de
Page 126 and 127: Figure 6.15—Costs of action and i
Page 128 and 129: Of interest to us is the strategy t
Page 130 and 131: 7. PARTNERSHIP CONCEPT The review o
Page 132 and 133: degradation. All this should be don
Page 134 and 135: Finally, the global assessment of D
Page 136 and 137: the experience of and lessons learn
Page 138 and 139: Table 7.3—Example of E-DLDD resea
Page 140 and 141: 8. CONCLUSIONS Since the publicatio
Page 144 and 145: Table A.1—Land degradation assess
Page 146 and 147: Table A.2—Continued Author Region
Page 148 and 149: Table A.3—Continued Author Countr
Page 156 and 157: Table A.5—Costs of land degradati
Page 158 and 159: Figure B.1—Land use systems of th
Page 160 and 161: REFERENCES Abelson, P. 1979. Cost B
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Page 164 and 165: Clark, E. H. 1985. The Off-Site Cos
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Page 168 and 169: Foster, V., and C. Briceño-Garmend
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Page 180 and 181: Tan, Z. X., R. Lal, and K. D. Wiebe
Page 182 and 183: ———. 2010. “Assessment of L
Page 187 and 188: RECENT IFPRI DISCUSSION PAPERS For
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