The Land Degradation Assessment in Drylands (LADA) project, funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) in association with UNEP and the Global Mechanism (GM) of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UN-CCD) and executed by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), responds to the need to strengthen support to combat land degradation as foreseen by the UN-CCD.
During the first phase of the project (2002-2004), LADA aims to generate up-to-date ecological, social, and economic and technical information, including a combination of traditional knowledge and modern science, to guide integrated and cross-sector management planning in drylands. The principal objective of the LADA project is the development of tools and methods to assess and quantify the nature, extent, severity and impacts of land degradation on ecosystems, livelihood systems, watersheds and river basins, and carbon storage in drylands, at a range of spatial and temporal scales. The project will also build national, regional and global assessment capacities to enable the design and planning of interventions to mitigate land degradation and establish sustainable land use and management practices.
The LADA E-mail conference (October 9 to 4 November 2002) responded to several of LADA's objectives by providing a forum to: exchange ideas on potential land degradation indicators and integrated methods; disseminate documents reviewing data and information on land degradation in drylands; and initiate the development of a network among national, regional and international teams involved and interested in land degradation assessment of drylands. Specific goals of the E-mail conference were to raise awareness on LADA, exchange expert views on land degradation assessment, and start identifying at relevant scales:
data sets that can be used to assess land degradation,
biophysical, socio-economic and institutional indicators that explain the root causes, driving forces, status, and impacts of and responses to land degradation,
feasible methodologies to assess land degradation, and
key issues regarding indicator and method development for land degradation assessment.
The LADA E-mail conference initiated discussion on a number of key issues regarding land degradation assessment. Issues raised and suggestions provided during the E-mail conference will contribute to LADA indicator and methods development and more specifically to LADA's pilot studies - currently being developed for Argentina, Senegal, and China. The LADA E-mail conference facilitated dialogue among numerous stakeholders, especially among experts with experience in conducting global, national or local land degradation assessments.
It is anticipated that the LADA E-mail conference Web site
http://www.fao.org/landandwater/agll/lada/emailconf.stm
will become a continuing forum to continue this exchange of ideas on land degradation. Subscribers of the E-mail conference were encouraged to continue providing contributions, which will be posted on the LADA Web site.
