Cop16: Arab nations told they can play leading role in tackling drought

Billions of dollars needed to prevent land degradation reaching a tipping point

Cop16: Arab nations told they can play leading role in tackling drought. EPA

Arab nations, including the UAE, have been told they can play a bigger role when it comes to land and drought issues globally.

Given the region's expertise and knowledge, land, drought and water are domains “they can occupy,” Ibrahim Thiaw, executive secretary of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification, told The National.

One example is how Saudi Arabia has “taken the bull by the horns in organising a fantastic Cop”, Mr Thiaw said, as the UN's desertification conference in the kingdom comes to a close on Friday.

During the Cop16 summit, the Arab Co-ordination Group, a strategic alliance of 10 development finance institutions, pledged $10 billion to tackle the issue of land degradation.

The fund flows come after the launch of the Riyadh Global Drought Resilience Partnership on the summit's opening day. This initiative received an initial commitment of $2 billion from the Opec Fund and the Islamic Development Bank, along with $150 million from Saudi Arabia to help launch the project.

However, Mr Thiaw said that beyond financial firepower, he would like to see Arab nations exercise leadership and soft power in environmental diplomacy. “I felt like it is important for them to speak out and to exercise leadership,” he said.

Urgent action needed

A report released by the UN at the conference showed that, over the past three decades, more than three quarters of the Earth has become irreversibly drier.

Regions especially affected by the trend include most of Europe, parts of the western US, Brazil, sections of Asia, and central Africa.

The report also found that, by the end of the century, up to five billion people could reside in drylands, facing challenges such as degraded soils, shrinking water resources and the decline or collapse of once-thriving ecosystems.

Major drought events

Mr Thiaw told The National that urgent action is needed as land degradation has reached a tipping point that may be very difficult to treat. “It's like a body that has a disease, and you know that the disease has contaminated 40 per cent of the body,” he said.

It is estimated that 1.5 billion hectares of land will need to be restored by 2030. “We will need to invest the equivalent of $1 billion per day to achieve that. Again, the number is big, but $1 billion per day is the equivalent of the budget we spend on defence a year.”

Parties at the conference are now in the final stages of negotiation. Governments are expected to provide commitments to enhance resilience at all levels, building on recommendations from the Intergovernmental Working Group on Drought established at Cop15 in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, in 2022.

The summit in Riyadh concludes on Friday. It is the largest UN land conference to date, and the first UNCCD summit to be held in the Middle East.

Water scarcity

With drought, comes the issue of water scarcity. In August, the UAE pledged to raise water scarcity up the global agenda at the first council meeting of the Mohamed bin Zayed Water Initiative.

Led by Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, the council looked at ways to develop sustainable global access to water using breakthrough technologies and discussed priority projects.

President Sheikh Mohamed launched the initiative to tackle global water shortages in February, with an investment of $150 million.

There is also a five-year global XPrize Water Scarcity competition in place, which is offering $119 million in prizes. The competition is designed to provide widespread access to clean water by creating sustainable and affordable seawater desalination systems.