Land degradation is affecting two-fifths of humanity

The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), in its recently-published assessment report, has concluded that land degradation has reached the point where it has become a major contributor to mass human migration and increased conflict.  Land degradation, and the resultant loss of biodiversity and ecosystem services cost the equivalent of about 10% of the world’s annual gross product in 2010. Climate change and land degradation are predicted to force somewhere between 50 to 700 million people to migrate by 2050. This is likely to particularly problematic in dryland areas.

In an interview with Mahesh Sankaran, one of the lead authors, Mongabay-India looks at the report from an Indian perspective.