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By Ira Karen Apanay, Senior
Reporter
The Food and Agriculture
Organization of the United Nations has released a study revealing
that land degradation is intensifying in many parts of the world and
33 million Filipinos are among the 1.5 billion people affected by
it.
“Defined as a long-term decline
in ecosystem function and productivity, land degradation is
increasing in severity and extent in many parts of the world, with
more than 20 percent of all cultivated areas, 30 percent of forests
and 10 percent of grasslands undergoing degradation,” the food
organization said in a statement on Monday.
The study associated land
degradation with farming after data showed that almost 20 percent of
degrading land is cropland, or more than 20 percent of all
cultivated areas; 24 percent is broadleaved forest; 19 percent
needle-leaved forests; and 20 to 25 percent rangeland.
Cropland occupies only 12 percent
of the land area, so degradation is over-represented in cropland
globally, the study explained.
It linked land degradation to
population pressure and poverty. “Comparison of rural population
density with land degradation shows no simple pattern. Globally, the
correlation coefficient is [negative] 0.3; in general, the more
people, the less degradation. However, in some contexts, population
pressure is positively related to land degradation.”
In relation to poverty, the study
said, “Taking infant mortality rate and the percentage of children
under five who are underweight as proxies, there is some global
relationship between land degradation and poverty. However, a much
more rigorous analysis is needed.”
The food organization announced
recently that based on the study using data taken over a 20-year
period, an estimated 1.5 billion people, or one-fourth of the
world’s population, depend directly on land that is being
degraded.
The study, Global Assessment of
Land Degradation and Improvement, showed that there are 33,064,628
million Filipinos affected on land that is being degraded. It said
total degraded area in the country is 132,275 square kilometers.
The Philippines, though, was not
listed among the top countries experiencing severity of land
degradation. Russia leads the table with 16.5 percent, followed by
Canada (11.6 percent), the United States (7.9 percent), China (7.6
percent) and Australia (6.2 percent).
The study said the ranking by
loss of Net Primary Productivity (million tons) is: Canada (94),
Indonesia (68), Brazil (63), China (59) and Australia (50).
Ranking by proportion of the
country affected is: Swaziland (95 percent), Angola (66 percent),
Gabon (64 percent), Thailand (60 percent) and Zambia (60 percent).
Ranking by rural population
affected is: China (457 million), India (177 million), Indonesia (86
million), Bangladesh (72 million) and Brazil (46 million).
The Food and Agriculture
Organization also explained that the consequences of land
degradation include reduced productivity, migration, food
insecurity, damage to basic resources and ecosystems and loss of
biodiversity through changes to habitats at both species and genetic
levels.
“Land degradation also has
important implications for climate-change mitigation and adaptation,
as the loss of biomass and soil organic matter releases carbon into
the atmosphere and affects the quality of soil and its ability to
hold water and nutrients,” notes Parviz Koohafkan, the director of
the food organization’s Land and Water Division.
The data indicated that despite
the stated determination of 193 countries that ratified the United
Nations Conference to Combat Desertification in 1994, land
degradation is worsening rather than improving, the organization
said in a statement.
“Some 22 percent of degrading
land are in very arid to dry-subhumid areas, while 78 percent of it
are in humid regions. The study found that degradation is being
driven mainly by poor land management,” it added.
The present study shows that land
degradation since 1991 has affected new areas and some historically
degraded areas were so severely affected that they are now stable
having been abandoned or managed at low levels of productivity, said
FAO after comparing the present study with previous assessments.
The Food and Agriculture
Organization further said that the study shows that land degradation
remains a priority issue requiring renewed attention by individuals,
communities and governments.
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