After adapting to challenges of COVID-19, 2021 turned into a very busy and exciting year for the global WOLTS team.

La zone pastorale de la vallée de la Nouaho, dans la région du Centre-Est, a été créée pour assurer une sécurité foncière aux éleveurs et intensifier leurs systèmes de productions animales. Mais, de nos jours, elle est « infestée » par l’orpaillage dont l’ampleur préoccupe.

River Rwizi is located in Ankole Sub-region,  western Uganda. River Rwizi, which covers approximately 8,200km, is the source of water for livelihood to both people and animals in Rakai, Lyantonde, Isingiro, Lwengo, Kiruhura, Mbarara, Bushenyi, Buhweju, Sheema and Rubirizi.

The river is served by many swamps that include, Nyakafumura part of Mushasha water catchment and Kanyabukanja wetland. These swamps serve as water reservoirs or catchments that release water slowly to the river to serve communities around.

A Quarter of the world’s 4.4 billion hectares (10.9 million acres) of cropland is degraded, often due to drying, according to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). Just over a hectare and a half, or 4 acres, of that dried-out land have for years been located at Benedict-

pound) bags of produce from a 0.8-hectare (2-acre) plot, whether the rains are adequate or not.

Main photo: Farmers at a FAO anti-desertification project in Burkina Faso, one of 11 countries targeted by the Global Environment Fund Initiative

The global launch of a $104 million initiative signals an ambitious effort by a range of partners to safeguard drylands in the context of climate change, fragile ecosystems, biodiversity loss, and deforestation in 11 African and Central Asian countries.

Dzuds, a weather phenomenon characterized by extreme cold, used to be unusual. Now, they’re becoming the new normal.

DALANZADGAD, UMNUGOVI PROVINCE, MONGOLIA — Clouds gather in the moody winter sky, and the wind picks up. As the temperature plummets, sheep and goats turn from the pasture where they were grazing to huddle in the shelter of a shed.

Main photo: A herder collects snow to be melted down into drinking water.

The dzud is a peculiar weather phenomenon unique to Mongolia in which every few years a summer drought combines with a harsh winter. Nomadic herders can only despair as piles of dead, frozen sheep and goats stack up across the steppes, dead from either starvation or the cold. It is not uncommon to see a frozen animal dead on its feet.

All in all, despite COVID-19, the WOLTS team have had a highly productive year. In 2020  we've been adapting, taking stock,  writing  blogs, and  concluding  our pilot 'gender and land champions' training  programme in  Mongolia  and Tanzania.

UNDP-supported project to benefit close to one million vulnerable people in a nation where climate change is threatening natural resources and fragile ecosystems  

Main photo: The yak (Bos grunniens and Bos mutus) is a long-haired bovid found throughout the Himalaya region of south Central Asia, the Tibetan Plateau and as far north as Mongolia and Russia. (Used under Creative Commons license) Flickr/Arian Zwegers

An innovative community-based forest management policy has resolved a long-simmering land-use conflict between migratory yak herders and sedentary residents in a remote area of Bhutan.

CALL FOR INDIVIDUALS AND/OR ORGANISATIONS INTERESTED IN COORDINATING ILC’S GLOBAL WORK ON RANGELANDS AND MOBILITY

DEADLINE 15 AUGUST 2020

TERMS OF REFERENCE

We are launching this call to mainstream ILC’s commitment in support of pastoralists, mobility and security of rangelands for land conflict prevention and ecosystem restoration

‘WOLTS Team Perspectives’ is a new series of blogs launched in February 2020 by the global WOLTS team. In this series, field team members share their views about the impacts of the project’s action-research on gender, land and mining among pastoralist communities in Tanzania and Mongolia.