News and Analysis • Volume 1 • Number 1 • October 2007

Desertification convention faces uncertain future: what role for trade?

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Parties to the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) have adopted a ten-year strategic plan, which refers to trade as a tool to help realise some of its objectives, and also points to the need to consider issues related to sustainable land management in other forums, such as those dedicated to agriculture trade.

The UNCCD has frequently faced significant challenges both in terms of direction and political priority among its parties. The eighth session of the UNCCD Conference of the Parties (COP-8), held from 3-14 September in Madrid, concluded a ten-year strategic plan considered by many as solid. Decisions on the structure, role and responsibilities of the various UNCCD institutions, including the Committee on Science and Technology (CST), the Committee for the Review of the Implementation of the Convention (CRIC) and the Global Mechanism (GM), were seen as providing new guidance and opportunities for the convention to achieve its objectives.

However, the fact that the parties were unable to adopt the budget in the closing plenary left participants uncertain about how the reform package agreed in Madrid would be implemented. The budget has now been passed on to an extraordinary COP meeting in New York during the UN General Assembly.

Strategic plan seeks to enhance implementation

UNCCD implementation is supported by international cooperation and partnership arrangements. The track record over the past decade has pointed to several challenges however, including insufficient financial resources, a weak scientific basis, institutional weaknesses and difficulties in reaching consensus among parties.

Adopted in Madrid, the ten-year strategic plan and framework to enhance the implementation of the convention provides “a global framework to support the development and implementation of national and regional policies, programmes and measures to prevent, control and reverse desertification/land degradation and mitigate the effects of drought through scientific and technological excellence, raising public awareness, standard setting, advocacy and resource mobilisation, thereby contributing to poverty reduction.”

The strategic plan aims to provide a common and focused vision for the convention and to address operational inefficiencies within its institutions. It links the work programmes of the convention’s institutions to this common vision, clarifies their mandates and methods of work, and institutionalises a results-based management approach. Speaking at COP-8, several ministers and senior officials emphasised that the ten-year strategic plan needs concrete and preferably quantitative goals, which must be accompanied by an implementation framework and a substantial budget. Others pointed out that the plan should emphasise enhanced capacity at the local level with regard to climate change adaptation, and called for increased support to developing countries to combat desertification and for the adoption of better regional and global integrated strategies.

While discussions at COP-8 focused on issues related to the implementation framework, i.e. the roles and responsibilities of the various UNCCD institutions, partners and stakeholders in meeting the strategic and operational objectives of the strategic plan, the next steps in the process will involve the formulation of an action plan with measurable targets, quantitative indicators and a timeline by COP-9.

In Madrid, the participants also emphasised the close relationship between desertification and climate change, an issue that has risen higher on the political agenda, particularly over the last year.

Trade – a tool to support implementation

The strategic objectives of the ten-year plan involve improving the living conditions of affected populations and ecosystems, generating global benefits through effective implementation of the UNCCD, and mobilising resources to support the implementation of the convention. As such, effective partnerships between national and international actors will need to be built. The text considers trade as a tool to achieve different operational objectives, which will guide the action of all UNCCD stakeholders and partners in achieving the overarching strategic objectives. More specifically, the document acknowledges the need for desertification/land degradation to be addressed in relevant international forums such as those pertaining to agricultural trade. It also notes that innovative sources of finance and financing mechanisms to combat land degradation should be identified, including private sector financing, market-based mechanisms, trade, and other financing mechanisms related to biodiversity conservation and sustainable use.

Work in the intersessional period leading up to COP-9 will need to focus on how to concretise and help operationalise the strategic objectives spelled out in the ten-year plan. In this regard, there is significant scope to flesh out the role that trade can play to help – and certainly not hinder – sustainable land management.