Land Restoration and Social Context: Opportunities for Successful Land Restoration
Discussion Paper No. 23/005
Land restoration is an intentional activity that initiates or accelerates the recovery of an ecosystem with
respect to its health, integrity, and sustainability . There are numerous studies documenting substantial economic, social, and environmental benefits from land restoration . However, despite this, the rate of land degradation remains significantly higher than the rate of land restoration globally. Some of the reasons behind this continued land degradation are well known, such as social and longer-term nature of most land restoration benefits, numerous economic and institutional barriers for land restoration, such as land tenure insecurity, lack of access to funding, lack of extension and rural advisory services, and others. However, there are also numerous examples of communities and countries which achieved significant land restoration successes. This conference provided a valuable opportunity to discuss and exchange about successes and failures of land restoration focusing on the social context, and highlighted solutions and opportunities for successful land restoration.
