The Tehuacán-Cuicatlán Valley, Mexico, is the semiarid region with the richest biodiversity of North America and was recently recognized as a UNESCO’s World Heritage site. Original agricultural practices remain to this day in agroforestry systems (AFS), which are expressions of high biocultural diversity. However, local people and researchers perceive a progressive decline both in natural ecosystems and AFS.

Knowledge transfer depends on the motivations of the target users. A case study of the intention of Indonesian coffee farmers to use a tree canopy trimming technique in pine–based agroforestry highlights path-dependency and complexity of social-ecological relationships. Farmers have contracts permitting coffee cultivation under pine trees owned by the state forestry company but have no right to fell trees.

By declaring the Decade on Ecosystem Restoration, the UN has recognized that there are only 10 years left to restore the world's degraded land. Countries are striving to fight climate change by 2030 through their Paris Agreement commitments and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). But in many cases, their climate and development agenda are disconnected, even though sustainability and development go hand in hand – especially for rural communities. The divide is particularly severe when it comes to restoring degraded land.

In a world grappling with the challenges of food insecurity, climate change, landscape degradation, and rural poverty, regreening offers a path forward, especially in dryland areas. The transformation of degraded landscapes—restoring productivity and increasing resilience through the widespread adoption of agroforestry and sustainable land management practices—can deliver food, climate, and livelihood benefits.
Table of contents:
Part I. Introduction
Part II. How and Where is Regreening Happening?
Part III. The Impacts Of Regreening

These guidelines have been developed based on FAO’s and WOCAT’s extensive experience. The book draws, in particular, on WOCAT’s network and its database of SLM knowledge - as well as on WOC AT’s first overview book entitled ‘Where the land is greener’. These guidelines were implemented in the framework of the TerrAfrica partnership, whose main objective is to mainstream and upscale SLM in SSA, through the leveraging and harmonising of multisectoral investments at the local, country, subregional and regional levels.

Valuable lessons can be learned from smallholder farmers who have successfully protected and regenerated tree cover across agricultural landscapes in Senegal, with minimal reliance on tree nurseries, seedling distribution or tree planting. In the process, they have restored soil fertility to sustainably increase agricultural production.

In the above initiatives, self-motivated populations increased food security and reduced vulnerabilities to climatic shocks by restoring and sustainably managing local forest resources. To regenerate agroforestry parklands, farmers built on traditional systems to increase on-farm tree density and convert degraded lands to densely wooded savannas. These actions increased crop yields and produced new sources of livestock browse. The population of Sambandé restored the local forest and managed it to sustainably produce fuel and fruit.

‘Over the past three decades hundreds of thousands of farmers in Burkina Faso and Niger, on the fringes of the Sahara Desert, have transformed large swathes of the region’s arid landscape into productive agricultural land, improving food security for about three million people. Once-denuded landscapes are now home to abundant trees, crops, and livestock.'

L'année 2019 a marqué le début de la Décennie des Nations Unies pour l'agriculture familiale 2019-2028 (DNUAF), la résolution (A/RES/72/239) approuvée à l'unanimité par l'Assemblée générale des Nations Unies (ONU) en décembre 2017 comme preuve du grand intérêt du sujet a soulevé dans les pays et dans l'agenda international et en soulignant que l'agriculture familiale est la pierre angulaire pour faire face aux grands défis de l'humanité.

La pandémie de covid-19 a fait apparaître au grand jour la vulnérabilité des systèmes agroalimentaires face aux chocs et aux situations de stress et entraîné une augmentation de l’insécurité alimentaire et de la malnutrition au niveau mondial. Des mesures doivent être prises pour rendre les systèmes agroalimentaires plus résilients, plus efficients, plus durables et plus inclusifs. 

Repenser nos alimentations, c’est repenser nos sociétés. Car partager un repas et même faire ses courses sont des moyens de se relier aux autres. La façon de nous nourrir construit notre santé. Nos modes de production agricole façonnent nos paysages et définissent notre place dans la nature. Gérer des ressources pour produire, pour transformer et pour distribuer les aliments fonde nos économies. Nos registres du comestible, nos cuisines et nos manières de table racontent nos cultures.

Le présent document d’orientation analyse les tendances du commerce agroalimentaire à l’échelle mondiale et par groupes de pays, en accordant une attention particulière aux modèles commerciaux dans les pays en développement.