Special High-Level Event on Sand and Dust Storms (SDS) - Action Dome, UNCCD COP17

English channel, English channel.
English channel.
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So interpreter will change.
So when the speaker or when they make the non English speeches, the interpreter should change to English.
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Can you hear me? Microphone.
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So now we let in Mongolian interpreters.
Mongolian channel, please speak up something.
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I'm speaking in English English, can you hear me? What? Can you hear? Can you hear an English channel? Yeah.
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And you can you hear the second interpreter, please confirm.
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I hear your voice very quickly, actually.
As for some reason.
So if you have this one with the microphone and the headphone.
If you have something, can you hear me now? Can you check interpreter, so is the voice any better? Okay.
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Exchange because they need to be because the other that's the That's It Yes.
You want to know something.
I look okay? Hello, ladies and gentlemen.
I wonder if I could just have a moment of your time.
We are just waiting for a number of dignitaries to make their way to us.
You know what cop is like, rushing from one meeting to another.
So we're waiting for our doctor Amina, Her Excellency, to make her way to us.
She's rushed thing over, I understand, hopefully on a cart.
If you could please allow us up to 10 minutes before we begin.
You have a few moments, I think, just to complete your networking, always important at COPs.
And then we will begin in under 10 minutes time.
I've just seen a cart pull up, so it could be quicker, and of course, we're expecting our PS as well, doctor Yasmin Fouad.
Thank you very much for your patience.
Thank you.
I think that's on the way.
Okay.
You All right.
Is that? When I came to, how do you want to be described? Here.
Could you take Bubba closer to the stage at this moment? Sure.
She sits down.
So if they see Bubba there, hopefully, they'll sit down.
Could you just take Bubba to the side of the stage, the other way down.
Ws Bubba speaking, check that his seat is.
Thank you very much.
Okay.
Go to the side.
Go to the side.
Go, Baba.
Psych Say on Psy S Psy it Ty craving on psycho Eliot P Mom got in my whole Amen None you law none you law Amen Tapitoo Hank Hang Bill your Am Rab Haman I'm going to die here with your grand on hand.
This has been a with this really important subject.
I really want to read something here that I prepared when I was coming in French first, and then I will say something in English.
S and grand tour a Mongoli creator, the culture, the civilisation.
A dessert.
The peur last later, Latter Muri vibre Novilage novel F, Ns agriculture, Atreuf La vid fragile, desert Nepal Abstra, origini, La Valle de Flores Senegal, Danza Sit of Portuguese Sahel, Laval Planes Cher, long period stamp lacion law, Lapsma the sole fragility epturage.
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Tropo Value ambassador Volunteer, Covion, Gpzilv Silva Anton Curtis.
I'm born at Euador.
When I stand up near the port of Puador small port of Puador I'm facing Mauritania.
When I was young, I was born Between my mom and dad, of course, but grandparents in the big family.
We used to cross the river for six months to stay there to do agriculture.
At that moment, sometime I see my mom and the oldest woman of the family and the oldest villages around us running sometime, very scared because we see from far away sandstorm coming to us.
We never get used to that.
That moment, especially the women, they want to protect the children, the animals, and they don't know exactly what's going to happen.
We never get used to that.
This is why we understood that you can be from Senegal, but you are connected to Mauritania and you are even connected to the North African countries.
Whatever happens there, don't think about border.
You just come to us and you can see the impact of sand and dust in our lives.
But I think human beings have to go away from fatality and think deeply that we can arrange things.
If you come together, you can see solutions, we can restore lands, we can restore our forest, and to bring together all the things that when I was growing up, I was seeing it and I wanted to sing so much about this lovely part of Africa.
Things are changing because of climate change, because of desertification.
And when some of the young people they go to into my songs are very deeply connected to our culture, there are many words that was referring to that time when I was growing up that they didn't understand.
And I hope together here at this school, we can find the solution to restore lands, to stop desertification, and to get away from dust and sandstorms.
Thank you very much.
Baba.
Thank you very much, indeed.
And I don't know about you folks, Baba, I'm going to invite you just to take the seat.
I think we've got a seat reserved for you.
Thank you very much.
What a voice, ladies and gentlemen.
And not an instrument, not an accompaniment.
And that is true passion.
You've never heard of Baal, you have now, literally.
I asked him, I said, Baba, how do you describe yourself? He said, I'm an activist, as you heard.
He's a humanitarian.
He's also a UN goodwill ambassador.
I don't know if you mentioned that, but he travels the world with the UN, doing whatever he can.
Of course, he is an amazing musician.
Now, all of this work, of course, going towards protecting the most vulnerable in our community, in our world.
I say community, it's the global community that need the support, but also the solidarity of the UN.
So what we're doing here matters.
The messages we get out matter and the Distinguished leaders that have gathered in this room today are absolutely testament to that.
It is therefore my pleasure to welcome to this special high level event, and I invite my distinguished guests to join me on the stage as I announce them.
Our hosts, His Excellency, the Vice President of the Department of Environment and Climate Change for Mongolia, Monmir Bayer, on behalf of the Cop 17 presidency, please welcome.
Thank you very much indeed.
I'll ask you to sit here.
Thank you.
And joining him today.
Her Excellency, Amina Mohammed, Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations.
Her Excellency Yasmin Fouad, Executive Secretary of the UN CCD.
Her Excellency, Amida Salsa Alice Jabana, the Executive Secretary of ECAP.
Thank you very much.
And, Her Excellency, Inga Anderson, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Program.
Thank you.
I mean, talk about a power panel, an absolute honor for myself to be here.
So, Excellency's colleagues, ladies and gentlemen, a warm welcome to our discussion on mitigating sand and dust storms.
I'm just going to grab an additional microphone just so that we are ready before I invite my first speaker.
Thank you very much, Excellency.
Yes.
So before we commence with our opening remarks, on behalf of all of us here, I would like to thank the government of Mongolia and the Cop 17 presidency for their outstanding leadership and such warm hospitality.
It's been wonderful being in your country.
Thank you very much indeed.
And of course, through their vision and commitment, Mongolia has brought the international community together to advance action on some of the most urgent challenges facing our planet.
Your Excellency, you have 3 minutes.
The floor is yours.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you for getting to integrated all.
Your Excellency, miss Amina Mohammed, Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations, and Her Excellency, miss Yasmin Ford, Executive Secretary of the United Nations Commission to Combat Certification, Excellency, miss Arma Sasa Adi Jaba, the Under Secretary-General of the United Nations and Executive Secretary of the United Nations, Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific.
And Mr.
Lee Is, Secretary-General of the trilateral cooperation Secretariat, and distinguished guests and delegates.
Ladies and gentlemen, here in Mongolia, the connection between land, water, and human well being is visible in every landscape.
When land is degraded and water becomes scarce, the consequences do not remain confined to one place.
The ride with the wind cross borders and affect communities far beyond their source.
This is why today's high level learned is both timely and important.
It is my pleasure to welcome you to Lambatar and to this important event at UNCCT Cp 17.
As we mark Watpe CP 17, we are reminded that sand and dust storms are only environmental challenge.
They affect public health, food and water security, livelihoods, infrastructure, and economic development.
The power consequence and driver of the land degradation and water insecurity.
Mongolia is one of the major source of the sand and dust storms in Northeast Asia.
Over the past 35 years, number of dust storms has increased by two to five days in some parts of our country.
With certain areas now experiencing 5-40 such days a year.
These figures are clear call for action.
We must place source mitigation at the center of our response by restoring degraded land, managing land, water resource sustainability, and strengthening the resilience of communities.
At the same time, sand and dust storms are trans boundary challenge that requires cooperation.
Dust can travel hundreds or even thousands of kilometers from its source.
No country can address this challenge alone.
Effective action requires leadership, scientific cooperation, and investment.
Mongolia therefore welcomes the Global Implementation Initiative for sand and dust storms as an important mechanism for translating international commitments into coordinated action during the UN decade on combating sand and dust storms from 2025 and 2034.
We are also proud to have launched, together with the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia Pacific and trilateral cooperation Secretariat the initiative on strengthen Transboundary cooperation for sat and dust storms.
This launchmarks an important milestone in advancing our collective efforts to combat sand and dust storms.
By structuring early warning systems, transboundary risk assessments, knowledge sharing and policy engagement, the initiative will contribute to the environmental security and sustainable development across northeast Asia.
Earlier this morning, we also officially launched the Water and Nex Initiative, underscoring the interconnected relationship between the healthy and sustainable water management and resilient communities.
These initiatives will form part of the S action agenda, the legacy of Cop 17.
Through this agenda, we seek to ensure that commitments and partnerships advanced here in Odmbata are translated into coordinated, practical and sustained action well beyond this conference.
I invite all parties and partners to use today's dialectic to identify solutions that can be scaled up, mobilize the partnerships, and financing required and turn our shared commitments into lasting results.
Together, we can protect healthy land and build more resilient feature.
Thank you very much.
Excellent City Bad Biya, thank you very much indeed.
Before we move on to hear the first of our opening remarks from our panel, can I just I do apologize.
I know it's so tempting to network when we're in this room, but the acoustics mean that even a conversation at the back, at the door, the entrance door carries forward.
So I will ask, please, whilst our speakers are talking, just to keep your conversations to the minimum, just out of respect.
Thank you very much, indeed.
Thank you.
And so our next speaker, hardly needs an introduction.
She is a figure that is widely recognized as one of the architects of the SDGs, the Sustainable Development Goals.
And her presence today reflects the importance of the United Nations and its attachment to combating sand and storms as part of the wider effort to build resilience, protect ecosystems, and achieve sustainable development, not for one, but for all.
Madam Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed, thank you very much indeed.
Please launch the Secretary-General framework for action on andinusals.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
Excellencies, our distinguished delegates, friends, colleagues.
May I just say to my brother Babamal, thank you so much for sharing your testimony of our people.
It's very deep.
It's very personal, and we deeply appreciate you being here to share that with us.
Yesterday, we heard a statistic that should stop us in our tracks that the share of land affected by diversification and degradation here in Mongolia has soared from around 65 to 81%.
UNCCD data tells us a similar tale, showing that the number of sand and dust storms days has tripled since the 1990s.
The desert is encroaching, the land is losing resilience, and communities are paying the price.
But this is not Mongolia's story alone.
Across our world, sand and dust storms affect hundreds of millions of people, more than 150 countries.
Last year, China saw its worst dust intrusion in a decade, while dust activity broke records along the United States Mexico border.
In Central Asia, the dried bed of the Aral Sea is releasing dust and toxic salts into the Aric atmosphere.
Across the Sahel, the Middle East, and other dry lands, communities face degraded land, drought, climate stress, and increasingly precarious livelihoods.
Dust carries no passport.
It blows across our oceans and borders, disrupting agriculture, food systems, closing airports and roads, damaging infrastructure and energy systems, harming biodiversity, and entering people's lungs far from its source.
Sand and dust storms are not just an environmental issue.
They are a development issue.
They're a health issue, a food security issue, an economic issue, and increasingly an issue of human security and regional cooperation.
At a time when geopolitical tensions are mounting, fiscal space is shrinking and many developing countries are struggling under debt and climate pressures, these storms are another multiplier of vulnerability.
Member States recognized this phenomenon when they proclaimed to 2025 to 2034, the United Nations decade on combating sand and dust storms.
They saw how sand and dust storms undermine progress on 11 of the 17 sustainable development goals, and they call for stronger international and regional cooperation, greater investment in science, research, innovation, indigenous knowledge, and partnerships to take pilots to scale.
The Secretary-General framework we launch here today is a response to that.
It organizes the UN's work around four priorities.
First, raising awareness and improving understanding.
We must make the scale, the causes and the consequences visible not only to environmental ministries, but to finance ministers, to health systems, farmers, businesses, and communities.
Second, sharing knowledge and best practices.
That means stronger science, better data, early warning and advisory systems, and a greater use of innovation, including artificial intelligence and foresight.
It also means connecting UN knowledge platforms so that core countries can find and use the expertise that already exists.
Third, mobilizing action.
We must take successful projects to scale with a sense of urgency.
We must integrate sand and dust storm priorities into global national agendas and mobilize technical and financial resources, including innovative finance and private investment.
And fourth, fostering genuine collaboration.
Transboundary challenges require transboundary solutions, connecting our work to climate, to biodiversity, desation and disaster risk reduction, and bringing governments all governments together with science, with the civil society, communities, and the private sector.
For me, this agenda is also very personal.
I come from Nigeria, where I had the privilege of serving as my country's Minister of environment.
I've seen what land degradation does to people's lives.
I've seen the pollution.
I've seen the exacerbation of conflicts between herders and farmers or in the Lake Chad with a terrorist organization.
I've seen the promise of initiatives like Africa's Great Green Wall, an amazing idea born out of leaders of the AU in Senegal and Nigeria.
It aims not only to restore landscapes, but to create green jobs, strengthen food systems, and give young people hope.
The same lesson applies to this decade.
Environmental restoration must connect land, livelihoods, resilience, and peace.
No country, as we have heard, can do this alone, and that is why the UN system must work differently.
The United Nations Coalition on combating sand and dust storms already brings together 21 of our agencies, but also our regional economic commissions.
The framework makes that collective capacity more accessible to member states.
Uniting science policy, and science policy, connecting early warning with anticipatory action, linking land restoration with food security, health, livelihoods, identifying scalable solutions, and helping our countries access partnerships, knowledge, and much needed finance.
But partnership runs both ways.
We need member states to bring forward their priorities and their solutions.
We need countries to share data and experience across borders.
We need political leadership to integrate this agenda international development and financing plans, and we need governments, international financial institutions, the private sector, and other partners to mobilize the resources to deliver on this decade of action.
Excellency ten years is long enough to change the trajectory, but short enough that we cannot afford to waste a single one year.
An African proverb always comes to mind.
If you want to go fast, go alone, but if you want to go far, go together.
Sand and dust storms show us how profoundly connected we are.
Particles from one place can darken the skies 1,000 kilometers away.
But solidarity can travel just as far.
Let let our determination be stronger than the winds that carry the dust.
We must enable knowledge, technology, finance, and solutions to cross those borders.
Together, we can restore land.
We can protect our communities and livelihoods and the future generations a world that is greener, more resilient, and more secure.
The UN is ready.
Let us make this decade count.
Thank you.
Your Excellency, thank you very much, indeed.
Thank you.
And just listening to what you had to say in that this issue has no borders.
I live in the UK, and we're not spoiled by fantastic weather, but I'm sure you've been following the news.
And it started last year with quite precedents, we noticed dust on our cars, but dust in spring.
And everybody was like, Oh, this dust, this dust.
And again, this year, we've had it since, I think the end of March, and not one person that I had a conversation with, maybe it's because I'm a geographer and I was born in Africa.
You learn to read the signs.
And I kept saying, but aren't you worried about why it's coming to us so early or where it's come from? And I don't think the dots have been joined up yet.
So it's not a question of it's over there.
It has arrived.
It has arrived.
So over the past few days, and I'm sure most of you in this room have heard the UNCCD executive secretary speak with absolute urgency about sustainable land management, restoration, and drought resilience.
It's wonderful to listen to her speak.
Well, she is now going to set out how the global implementation Initiative on sand and dust storms can bring those priorities together, helping countries to reduce dust emissions at source whilst protecting the communities most at risk.
Doctor Yasmin Fouad, the floor is yours.
Thank you very much indeed.
Thank you very much.
I'll not be long, but maybe I'll add to what the DSG said.
Thank you very much for joining us today.
Thank you for the Cp and for my sister Inger and definitely for my brother Mukaar for being here with us on behalf of the minister.
The DSG has just launched the framework, and I would like to recognize the work that has been done before I joined the UN CCT by 2021 organization from sister UN organizations under the leadership of the DSG.
And how can we move forward in that? Based on CP 16 decision, there was the mandate that the UN CCD based that they convene 197 parts that they would look on how best to start looking into implementation on the ground.
For just the, the SDS or the number of sand and stone that goes to the atmosphere each year is 2 billion tons.
That is around 350 size of the pyramids of the where I come from.
So we all always think that that's when that's weather.
That's not.
That's unsustainable management of our land.
That's how we're doing in overgrazing.
That's how human activity on the land goes back to the air.
Is there solutions? The solution starts from the ground as everything else starts from the ground, as the way we start walking, we walk on the ground and on the land and so forth.
Based on that, the UN CCD in collaboration with different parties because there are different regions.
You can see here the eternal blue sky as they say here in Mongolia, but that's not the case in other parts of the world.
So, number one, what we think as we collectively as UN system has collaborated on that framework, parties should start collaborating at the regional and the sub regional level because we cannot do it alone.
Secondly, on that implementation, it requires three things.
First of all, raising the awareness on how much which is part of the framework.
This is really important, connected to economy, connected to health, but much more connecting to the woman even when they go out of their in the rural areas to go back to get their food or to deliver their children or do that kind of transport, this hinders their life and their process.
So it is really very serious.
The second part is the regional and the sub regional cooperation because no country can do it alone.
It has no passport.
I always say that and no national boundaries.
You cannot get a passport to say, with the sand and the storm is moving from this country to the other.
And this requires really a political commitment.
And the third thing, which is magnificent, and we saw some piloting case studies in that part, investment of the private sector.
In every single word that relates to land restoration, I will keep saying that the finance that's there up in the sky is not enough.
Private sector can do land restoration, can contribute to sand and dust storm that is in the air by investing in the land, can make mitigation to the drought resilience And can really work on land and water interlinkage.
So whatever topic you're talking about related to our land, the private sector has a stake we need just to show how this can really happen.
We would be more than happy to collaborate with parties to continue under the leadership of the DSG and SG himself on providing services to our partner as a platform to convene that.
But one important final remark is the source mitigation.
The early warning system is a very important part and one part of what we're doing here, maybe it's not very much related, which is behind the wall here on the On the left, this is what I have been promoting since yesterday is the Ira, the International Drought Resilient Observatory.
The screens there behind that white wall can tell you in each country, if you go to Egypt, for an example, I would say drought because I can see it in cover shift in the Nile Delta that we need to handle that.
But that this observatory can tell me, no, you need to invest in the 1.5 million for that the country has just did because that investment can cause you less than what you have invested in this part.
This is exactly what we're talking about.
The source mitigation and the toolbox that we have been collaborating with different UN partners is the beginning and it's there, and we hope that the parties in this CP would give us a mandate to continue advancing on that and giving the implementation to the other UN sister convention, the RCs as well.
Thank you very much.
Madam Executive Secretary, thank you very much indeed.
So we heard there.
Her Excellency talking about connections, connections.
To help us with connecting the ambition into the action, I'm now pleased to invite the current co chair of the United Nations Coalition on combating sand and dust storms, who has helped strengthen regional cooperation, science, and knowledge sharing across regions that have been most affected.
Madam Executive Secretary Amida Salcea Alice Giovana, I'd like to ask you, how can the coalition help turn the ambitions of the decade into coordinated action on the ground? Thank you very much.
Thank you very much.
And I would like to start by recognizing the leadership of the Cp 17 presidency, Mongolia, as well as the HD, of course, the overall leadership of the SD, my colleague Jasmine, as well as ID Inger.
So again, on this Sun and Storm, the SES launched formally launched the UN framework on Sun and Storm.
And this year is actually already in implementation because runs 2025-2034.
So in this context, again, as lead the current the current co lead ECA together with ESCOA we are the second year of this co chairship.
We would like to share two initiative.
First one, the first one was launched that was in Turkey, to look at the exact in July, early July of this year, it was launched in Turkey.
This inter regional initiative to combat and and dust storm in Western Asia comprises of countries, namely Islamic Republic of Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the Syrian Arab Republic, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates, in which the ten countries jointly agreed on a detailed and common programmatic initiative to mitigate the impact of sun and dust storm in the region.
And this initiative is supported jointly by ESCOA as well as ESCA.
The ten participating countries agreed on a shared three year program of work and clear priorities for cooperation.
It demonstrated how sustained evidence based engagement can build the confidence needed to move from mere consultation, dialogue, and all this meeting to coordinate action even in the most complex circumstances.
Maybe I would like to underline this, I think the special or the unique circumstances circumstances of a country I do apologize.
Yeah.
I'll give you.
In a similar vein, I'm also pleased to announce, but I think Excellency already also shared earlier that today, just before the session, actually, we launched the government of Mongolia and the trilateral cooperation Secretariat, the so called the Mongolia TCS, as well as SCAP Initiative on sun and dust storm in Northeast Asia.
TCS comprises, this is also quite unique, comprises of the three major countries, China, Japan, and Republic of Korea.
Therefore, this initiative leverage the comparative advantages of the TCS countries, namely China, Japan, and Republic of Korea, as well as the comparative advantage that Mongolia can offer go forward the Sand and dust storm Initiative, especially in East Asia with this specific situation where Mongolia is highly exposed to the impacts of sand and dust storm while also facing challenges in managing dust source areas.
The initiative builds on the commitment, again, of China, Japan, and Republic of Korea its strengthen cooperation under the so called trilateral plus X framework.
So actually earlier, this initiative was agreed during the DCS summit back then, 2024.
By providing a platform for joint action, it will help countries exchange knowledge, strengthen regional cooperation, and address a challenge that extends beyond national borders.
And I'm also pleased to note that this initiative, support the regional plan of action on SN and dust storm in Asia Pacific that was initiated back then quite early 2021, 2022, and contributes obviously to the objectives of the UN deed on combating sun and dust storm and especially on the UN framework that DST just launched.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you, Excellency.
Our next speaker has long been one of the world's leading voices when it comes to ecosystem restoration, environmental resilience, and sustainable development.
And her presence reminds us, I think that tackling sand and dust storms means addressing the root causes and putting healthy ecosystems and resilient landscapes at the heart of the response.
So please welcome the Madam Executive Director Inga Anderson to help us with understanding what needs to be scaled now in order to make this UN decade a success.
Thank you.
The floor is yours.
Well, first of all, I'd like to pay tribute to Mongolia for extraordinary leadership and for hosting us here, and, of course, to the DSG for the real leadership that you have shown throughout your two terms and for being a real champion of this issue, and of course, to our kind host of Cp 17 and Bravo for all the great work and my dear sister Ama.
And so this issue is one that if you're in this room, you may indeed have experienced this sand and dust storm and hearing Bab Maal beautiful singing, which I didn't understand, but which completely melted my heart.
And then what you said.
It took me back to when I was a very young woman, 1982, arrived in Sudan, and I was a volunteer doing work for seven years in that beautiful country.
And I saw this wall.
Of yellow.
And if you haven't seen it, you don't know what it is.
And I was a very young woman not knowing what the wall was.
And I was in the school.
I was a teacher in a far flung village away in Northern Sudan, far north of Khartoum.
And this wall came and all the girls, it was a high school ran like you described.
Into the classroom, this was very basic school closing the windows.
You know the kind of basic schools we're talking about.
And we took our hijab and we just rolled it around our heads because otherwise you can't breathe.
And then, of course, the wall stays for days, but you have to get home and so on.
And it was these seven years that I experienced and saw.
I lived with a family who hosted me very basic humble circumstances.
In that village, I saw a child who has asthma at extraordinary levels.
Why is that? Well, it's exactly as you made the point, DSG.
These things connect to everything.
And so I wanted to mention that story because it sort of brings it to real life.
But many here have experienced this, so I humbly submit that I'm just one who had this opportunity and privilege of seeing and living.
But this new initiative, this global initiative that the Secretary-General through the DSG has now launched is super meaningful.
And of course, we have to talk about because we are seeing a great we have known sand and dust stormps from the beginning of time, but the intensity and the frequency is increasing.
So let's have a conversation about why that is.
And there are a number of causes and contributing factors to this.
Yes, climate change, let's just be very real.
And so we have to deal with that and our CO two emissions and all.
But beyond that, we have to have a conversation around overgrazing.
I had the privilege of visiting here, an area where the professor, the Brongolian professor was highlighting, indeed, overgrazing is a real dimension.
But of course, your flock is your wealth, and so we have to discuss.
We're not going to blame the herders, but we have to discuss how we can do this better.
And yes, over extraction, including dam building, over extraction, of course, and therein are international and cross border conversations that are needed to be had.
And yes, forest degradation, and yes, of course, conversion of land, and yes, fragmentation.
And each of these are we need to and this is what you and I will be saying together with our partners, we need to map the causes, but also the virulence, the intensity, and the frequency of these sand and dust storms.
What is the trajectory? Are they getting more intense, longer, et cetera? The ones that I lived, and there were many, I can tell you, would be four to five days at a go and you really cannot do anything during that time.
And so the solutions lie in addressing overgrazing, without blaming the herders, I insist, but working with herders, there were, and in the Arab world, there is a word called hema, which refers to protection, to set aside, to be gentle with.
And that word is one that is well understood in many, many cultures and speaks to how can we ensure that we work collaboratively with our herds and that we shift them around But we have in some places lost that because of colonial occupation or other issues, because maybe we've converted the land to agricultural, and it was not suited.
And so the land is exhausted and needs to recover.
Now there are real solutions, and this will be my last point.
And I just want to mention a place like Somalia, which obviously suffers intensely from this where we've had the privilege of working in Gal Munduq in Somalia with the people on restoration, on ensuring that you can have that shifting agriculture and the grazing, and reintroducing that which has been lost during colonial occupation, et cetera.
And those issues are very important.
So the Secretary-General new initiative that speaks to awareness and science, that speaks to how we share knowledge, that speaks to mobilizing around this issue and speaks to having collaboration across the UN.
That is the way.
And I want to absolutely pledge that we from UNP look forward to working with everyone on this important initiative.
Thank you.
Madam Executive Secretary, thank you very much, indeed.
And before we close this opening section, I just want to say it's inspiring and a privilege to hear from such an extraordinary group of leaders whose experience, authority, but also commitment is shaping the global response to some of our most pressing challenges of our time.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
And we're not done.
That was our opening section.
In a moment, let me take you through what is going to happen.
We have got two panels coming up with distinguished representatives from a number of countries that are part of the sand and dust storms response.
We are going to have responses from our panel members.
If we have time, we started off slightly late.
We will go to a Q&A section.
If we don't, we move on rapidly.
Time will be tight.
I'm warning you now you have up to three to 4 minutes to respond and I will interject.
I'd like to get you off as early as possible to bring this event to a close.
Let us begin, please.
Okay.
For our first panel, we are going to be addressing sand and dust storms at source.
And I'd like to welcome to the stage.
His Excellency, Aziz Abdukn Kov, the chairman of the National Committee on Ecology and climate from the government of Uzbekistan.
Thank you very much indeed.
Sorry.
Also, Her Excellency, doctor Ragd Assad Khadim Al Awey, the Deputy Minister of Environment of Iraq.
Thank you very much.
Followed by His Excellency Reza Abladh, the Deputy Minister of Environment and had and head also of NRWO of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
His Excellency, Mr.
As Mansur Sumar the Secretary of the Ministry of Climate Change and Environmental Coordination of Pakistan and our final guest.
Mr.
Lee Dan Bur, the Director General of the Academy of National Forestry and Grasslands of the People's Republic of China.
Thank you very much.
Welcome to the stage.
Ladies and gentlemen, I wonder if I could please ask you to keep the conversations and the noise down.
Ladies and gentlemen, please, can I have quiet? Thank you.
Okay.
And so we come to our first question.
Now, I'm going to come to Uzbekistan first.
Thank you, Your Excellency.
Now, the restoration of the Arakum landscape is addressing one of the world's largest human induced dust sources.
I'd love to know if you could share with us, please, what have been the most important lessons from that work and which are the most relevant to the global implementation Initiative and also the UN decades.
Your Excellency, you have 3.5 minutes.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Okay.
Thank you.
Dear colleagues.
For Uzbekistan, our experience show us that often dust and sandstorms treated as a forecasting and the disaster response issue, but I think it's not enough.
The RLC as we know, has lost around 90% of its surface and volume and the exposes seabed has become the Arakum desert.
Major source of sand and dust emission, more than 150 million continually.
At the same time, we have already established protective vegetation across more than 2 million hectares of the dried up bottom of RLC.
And this experience has taught us the simple lesson, we must move from responding to dust storms to managing their sources.
Therefore, we welcome the global implementation initiatives on the sand and dust storms under the UN decade 2025 2034.
At the same time, we believe that its success should be measured not by the number of strategies and meetings, but by concrete figures, and restored, dust sources stabilized, communities protected and investment mobilized.
In this regard, B Son proposed four practical mechanisms.
First, the Central Asia is this investment program.
As you know, Central Asia already has a regional strategy on sand and dust storms management for 2021 to 2030, as well as national source maps and other technical tools and next step should be implementation.
With the support of UCCD a global mechanism, we propose to identify four or five priority dusk source landscapes and prepare integrated investment projects combining source stabilization, land restoration, protective vegetation, water, and soil management and community resilience.
And for each landscape, we propose a common dust source passport covering the source type of degradation, water conditions, suitable native species restoration technology, and expected reduction of dust emissions.
And objective should be clear to develop a regional investment portfolio for presenting to our financial partners and funds.
And we are ready to provide the ac and other dry land areas as demonstration platforms.
Second proposal and impact based regional warning Protocol.
Unfortunately, we don't have a integrated regional early warning system, and existing forecasting capabilities doesn't provide us accurate data and information.
So we propose to establish the network of regional automatic stations and also introduce a common regional protocol.
We propose that Central Asia countries and Mongolia can develop common data standards, three, four impact levels and predefined actions for health authorities, transport, aviation, agriculture, schools, and other sectors.
Third, we propose to strengthen the regional science and technology backbone.
As you know, Big Star is developing the Research Institute for combating desertification and developing of desert economy under Green University in Tashkent.
We propose using this existing scientific platform as a regional dryland Science and solution Hub than creating another international institutions.
It's practical instrument could be a dry and project lab connecting science, technology, field testing, and investment.
And this lab we can use to bring together 25 30 specialists and only from Central Asia, Mongolia, and other dryland regions, and it should be concrete results.
Investment ready projects, including baseline budget, safeguards, KPIs, and financing pathways.
Also, we propose to establish Central Asia, northeast Asia dryland technology breach, allowing restoration technologies, including s stabilization, native species, drone satellite monitoring, and AI based land assessment to be tested under different conditions before scaling.
Fourth, create a financing pipeline, not another financing institution.
One of the main barriers is not the absence of ideas, but gap between promising the idea and bankable project.
Therefore, I think we can use Central Asia project Preparation facility to finance feasibility studies, baseline and the MRV system and financial structuring.
Excellencies, I believe this is where the global implementation initiative can add real value.
We don't need another layer of strategy.
We need the delivery mechanism.
And I invite UD global mechanism WMO development banks, climate funds, and interested countries to work with us on these mechanisms.
Let us make the first phase on global implementation incentive measurable.
F six demonstration landscapes, regional impact based warning protocol, portfolio of investment ready projects, and clear financing pipeline by 2027, 2028.
This is our vision how we can turn the UN decade on combating sand and dust storms into decade of prevention, restoration, and investment.
Thank you.
Excellency, thank you very much for that.
Thank you.
Let us turn then to the experience of Iraq.
And I would like to know, Excellency, doctor Raghad, how is Iraq tackling those root causes when it comes to land degradation, drought, and water management? And what have you learned from cooperation with neighboring countries, including Kuwait.
Thank you.
Thank you.
It's an honor for me to be here with you.
For me in my country, we believe that a concept that the boundary sand and dust storm are transboundary problems and we have to take it as an regional and international integrity and solidarity moving away from unilateral state work.
We also want to integrating policy between water security and between drought rising and sand and dust storm because that if we make here, if we make a If we adopt a policy framework for equitable water allocation with upstream countries and for water management, we can lessen the rising of the drought which are feeding the dust storms and also we believe in making unified early warning systems with the regional countries by connecting our broadcasting stations with the broadcasting stations in the neighboring areas and also by connecting with others and making unique maps that show us the pathways of the storms and give us a precautions before the storms come to our country so we can lessen the environmental degradation cost and the loss and damage in agriculture, health, and the transportation sectors.
In Iraq, we are planning and working on ecosystem restoration policies to restore the graze land by planting a salinity resisting plants and native plants so we can restore our graland and also by expanding green belts around the big cities which are affected by drought and sand and dusty storm.
And also, we are looking for blended co financing with the private sectors to make sharing with them to benefit to get tangible benefits on the ground.
Thank you.
Your Eeny, thank you very much indeed.
Thank you.
And so we come to the example or rather the experience of Iran and Your Excellency Reza a ton How can the UN decade and the global implementation initiative turn all this political commitment into coordinated action on dust storms but also degraded landscapes? Yes, of course.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Sorry.
Now, can I just double check that we need translation? Are we yes or no? Do we need translation services for your response, or are you comfortable in English? I wonder if we could just confirm that, Your Excellency.
In English.
Wonderful.
Yes, just for me to repeat that, how can the UN decade and the global implementation initiative turn all this political commitment into coordinated action on dust storms but also degraded landscapes? Thank you.
Thank you, Madam.
In the name of God, ladies and gentlemen, desertification is not confined by the political boundaries of countries.
It is a global phenomenon that threatens environmental security and sustainable development across our planet.
Ofcing this crisis is a shared imperative and requires the cooperation of all countries and international organization extinguish participants.
The Islamic Republic of Iran ging oven is a strong national commitment and benefiting from international experiences has taken effective measures to combat desertification.
The year 2026, designated as the International Year of Randand and Studies provide valuable opportunity to devote great attention to the sustainable management of and lands and desert areas and to benefit from the experiences of different countries.
To date, approximately 88 million hectres in Iran have been subject to desertification control and mitigation measures while environmentally compatible mulching operations have been implemented across 286,000 hectres.
In addition, 1.4 million acres of man made desert forests have been established and watershed management and aquifer management measures have been implemented over an area of three, 2 million hectas Iran is among the pioneers in acceding to the United Nations Convention Combat D Certification and stands ready to share its knowledge, experiences, and successful models with other parties to convention.
We firmly believe that south south cooperation and engagement of international organization can facilitate and accelerate the achievement of the objective to convention.
We believe that addressing climate change and decertification is a global challenge that transcends political boundaries.
Therefore, access parties the convention to financial resources from forms such as the global environmental facility and the green climate form should be fair and equitable, free from political consideration and based solely on technical indicators, as well as their acclimated and environmental needs.
This incident, together with the glowing threats against natural capital has further highlighted the, the urgent need emerging phenomenon of ecotersm, the phenomenon that target the environmental security and natural capital of countries.
Let's let us stand together in condemning this emerging phenomenon of ecoterrorism and responsibly and connectivity.
To any action that threatens the natural capital and environmental security of nations which best wishes for a good planet, a bonded in peace, and a world filled with hope.
Thank you.
Excellency.
Thank you very much for sharing that message with us.
So how is Pakistan doing on this and what are the experiences? To share that with us.
And, Mr.
Secretary, to give some context, Pakistan faces connected pressures from land degradation.
We've got drought, we've got water stress, and then of course, on top of that sand and dust storms as well.
So how are restoration, but also sustainable land management mechanisms reducing the risk while strengthening resilience for those that matter? And I'm referring to communities.
The floor is yours.
You have 3.5 minutes, Your Excellency.
Thank you.
Sure.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Excellencies and distinguished colleagues.
For Pakistan, sand and dust storms are not only an environmental issue, They are closely linked with land degradation, drought, water scarcity, declining vegetation, and the livelihoods of vulnerable communities.
Around 80% of Pakistan's land mass is arid or semi arid.
In many of these areas, increasing pressure on land and water makes the soil more vulnerable to wind erosion and dust generation.
Our approach in Pakistan is therefore, very simple.
We must address the problem at its source.
Pakistan sees the landscape restoration and sustainable land and water management as central to reducing sand and dust storm risks.
This means restoring the vegetation cover, improving the range land management, promoting sustainable grazing, conserving soil and water, and using shelter belts and wind breaks wherever appropriate.
But restoration cannot succeed without communities, as Betty rightly pointed out.
Local communities are the first to experience the impacts of drought, negrded land, and declining natural resources.
They must therefore be partners in any restoration, not simply the beneficiaries.
By supporting sustainable land management and climate resilient livelihoods, we can reduce pressure on degraded landscapes while strengthening community resilience.
Ladies and gentlemen, science and technology must also support these efforts.
Satellite monitoring, remote sensing, drought monitoring, and early warning systems can help us identify the vulnerable areas, understand the emerging risks, and take preventive action.
Excellencies in Pakistan, our work in this area is still evolving.
Therefore, rather than presenting a complete success story, Pakistan would like to share an emerging lesson.
Preventing land degradation and restoring vulnerable landscapes is more effective than responding after the dust is already in the atmosphere.
This requires long term investment, strong institutions, community participation, science, and regional cooperation.
Pakistan is committed to strengthening these efforts and stands ready to learn from other countries, sharing our emerging experience, and work with the UN CCD and international partners to scale up the practical solutions.
Together, by restoring our land, we can reduce dust risks, protect livelihoods, and build more resilient communities.
Thank you.
Excellency, thank you very much.
And lessons shared are always welcome.
So thank you very much for that.
Well, let's turn now to the People's Republic of China and Director General Lee.
China is widely recognized for its large scale restoration, but also desertification control.
Now, which lesson or practice would you like to share and most recommend to countries seeking to reduce human induced dust sources.
The floor is yours.
Thank you.
To participate in this discussion, China has carried out long term practices, in storm monitoring, research, and governance, and accumulated a wealth of useful experience.
We hold that the key to reducing anthropogenic dust res improving ecosystem restoration lies in establishing long term systematic, science based, and coordinated governance system.
First, to strengthen monitoring and early warning to accurately identify dust sources.
We need to answer the question of where dust comes from, which is the foundation of governance.
The National Forestry and Granstand Administration of China has built an emergency res platform for sand dust storm disasters, integrating satellite remote sensing, ground based observation and meteorological data.
It enables early dynamic monitoring and comprehensive analysis of sand dust storm episodes.
In drawing on years of monitoring results, we pinpoint key sources of this to ensure resources are directed to regions mostly in need.
Second, adhere to long term planning and stable investment.
Since 1978, the Chinese government has Advanced desertification prevention and control through the Three North Shelter Forest Program and the suit of ecological initiatives.
Meanwhile, it has improved funding mechanisms, shifting from government led to government led with market driven vitality and fostered a diversified pattern with joint participation by the government and society.
Third, uphold law based governance and strengthen institutional safeguards.
The Chinese government has enacted and implemented multiple laws and regulations on equal protection, notably the desertification prevision and control law, which took effect in 2002 and the Equal Environment Code in force in 2026.
They provide a solid legal and institutional base for related efforts.
Fourth, adapt science informed governance tailored to local conditions, given market Given marked eco vaariation across different zones, we pursue vegetation development supported by water availability and balanced water resource carrying capacity, land suitability, eco rationality, and economic feasibility, transcend administrative boundaries, and implement systematic governance integrating different areas of mountains rivers, forest, farmland, lakes, grassland, and deserts.
Fifth, boost public outreach and education to build social consensus.
Prevention and control efforts call for social engagement through sustained outreach and education, we hold important events for the world Day to combat deserification and drought and the July 1st International Day of combating sand storms, public awareness keeps rising.
We recognize that sand storms exert transpendary impacts.
Under the global implementation Initiative, China stands ready to share experiences with all parties, support countries to explore governance models suited to their national realities.
Thank you.
Dear Chair.
To regain time.
Anybody have a pressing question? Are you happy for us to move forward? Because I'm here for you.
Okay, let's move on.
Thank you very much.
To my first panel.
Thank you for your time and thank you for sharing your experiences.
They are very much appreciated.
Thank you.
Thank you.
And whilst the panel makes its way back to the audience, could I have my second panel, please, up on the stage with me? So we've been focusing on what works.
Here we're going to focus on scaling the action, the science, the cooperation, the resilience, and the investment.
So to discuss through a number of issues for us, from the authority from Oman rather, from the Environment Authority of Oman, please welcome Mr.
Swat Salim A A Arimi, the Director General of Vegetation cover at the Environment Authority.
Thank you very much and welcome.
Mr.
Lee Guang Ho, the Director General of the Korean Forest Service for the Republic of Korea.
Doctor man Sad Al Katani, the Executive Vice President for the Meteorological Services of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Also joining us is Professor Mustafa A Hadidi Aidou, the Advisory Service to the Ministry of Environment and Urbanization, as well as Climate Change of Turka.
Mr.
Mora, Now, just bear with me.
I really want to get this name right.
Mr.
Murat Ter Zanov, who is joining us as Chairman of the Committee for and Resources Management for Kazakhstan.
Also, Mr.
Lee Fang Lee, Director of Land and Water Division at the Food and Agriculture Organization.
I am going to move out the way for you, so please join us on the stage.
Thank you.
Oh, no, you take the hot seat.
Okay, so our second panel, if you just allow me a moment.
Panel members, it's wonderful to have you with us.
And so we are going to go straight to Oman.
And Excellency, I'd like to know that well, I'd like to know how the country has long championed regional dialogue on shared environmental challenges.
So how can countries, regional organizations and partners actually work together to scale successful SDS solutions, but also deliver those visible results that are on the ground.
Mr.
Al Arami, the floor is yours.
You have 5 minutes.
Thank you.
Do you have a microphone? Okay.
I shall give you mine.
Thank you.
I'm going to speak in A if you don't mind.
The duel.
So steps.
We have been working with the international community and we have been following this desks and we have been trying to have early warning systems.
But the early warning systems only cannot solve the problems and the root cause of these problems.
And taking real steps also means that you have to have a way to deal with this and see this know sources.
And this makes it possible for us to analyze, identify these areas, the sources of this dust, and restoration of the land that has been impacted.
And this will also make it possible for us to restore this land and having a sustainable solution problems.
On our man side, we have had several initiatives to organize our work.
First, we had focused on science and it is relations on our actions, which has made it possible for us to integrate it to our actions so that we are able to restore land, to make sure that we reuse this dust.
We have also started using data to look at the data and analyze it and to see how we are able to make use of it and how to make it possible to use it to restore the land.
When we restore the land, we will be able to face this problem because this is the first line of defense to combat this problem so that we improve the situation and find a sustainable solution to this problem to make sure that we also take care of our food security.
Therefore, I Therefore, this doesn't only mean to fix this problem, but also means providing food to our area.
Thirdly, the cooperation regionally and internationally because national action is important, but also we also need to cooperate with the region in exchanging data and exchanging knowledge and coordinating the monitoring, early warnings and all these issues.
That are coordinated.
Therefore, this should not be only on exchange of experience, also mean of coordinating, taking action together, and widening the solution finding.
Fourthly, therefore, investment on the issues and implementation of international initiatives to focus to combat.
And also enabling or providing the resources that are needed to combat this problem.
Therefore, there has to be a coordinated efforts be regionally, internationally that involves the private sector to have a joint agenda to combat this issue.
Ladies and gentlemen, representative from various organizations, this is a real opportunity to achieve a real change to combat this problem and we hope we will be able to not only issue early warning on the dust, but also we will be able to have a general solution and find a sustainable solution and restore the degraded land so that we combat this dust and we'll be able to be resilient in the face of this by investing in our societies so that they are resilient and they are prosperous.
Thank you very much to all of you.
Well, and so to the Republic of Korea.
And the country has strong experience in science, monitoring, and also international cooperation.
So how can forecasting and knowledge sharing help countries move from reacting to storms to preventing their impacts and also tackling those root causes.
You have 3 minutes, Director General.
The floor is yours.
Thank you.
Thank you, Madam.
I would like to begin by expressing my sincere appreciation to the UCC Secretary and the government memorial for coming this important event.
Due to climate change and random degradation, the frequency and intensity of extreme sand and dust storms are continuously increasing.
According to our UNIC report, approximately 2 million tons of sand and dust enter the Atmosphere every year.
The Republic of Korea is no exception, demand trajectory in the past of the severe storms.
Every spring, the impro yellow and yellow dust and sandstones into the Korean Peninsula threatens our citizens respiratory health and their reliability.
Lives beyond health equals significant economic damage with production disruptions in our advanced semiconductor industry, paralyzing as logistics and dampening commercial and retail markets.
Low pests and he soils are the most popular nature based solution for fundamentally preventing sand and dust storms.
Poorestation and vegetation restoration in desertified source regions effectively b in and from being lifted into the atmosphere.
Furthermore, beyond serving as carbon sinks, police maximize soil water retention and restore the biodiversity devastated by desertication.
Bing city of the sand and dust storm issue.
The problem of Korea has been striving to mitigate dust storms and restore ecosystems through the Korea Mongolia Project.
Over the past 20 years, Korea and Mongolia have created a total of 3,000 hectar forest in areas such as Jesm and Dana Garden.
The Republic of Korea effective global sandstorm response through multilateral cooperation.
Through the Chin Initiative, we have supported the development of science based sand pools and through the densification and land degradation in Northeast Asia network, we have promoted the sharing of policies and knowledge related to sand storms as well as the development of pilot projects.
Sand and dust storms are no longer merely an environmental issue.
They are directly tied to our survival, impacting global property health, agriculture, and global supply chains.
We must address these challenges through science based, and replation and policy management.
The Korean government will continue to work closely with the UN CCD and its most contribution to storms mitigation across the world.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, Director General.
And now, as we head to the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, I'm going to put a challenge to you.
I'm being rather naughty, but I'm going to use my position right now to try and get an idea, if you can.
I don't know if you can pitch an idea for us on how restoration investment could be scaled globally.
You have so much experience, and the challenges that you have set yourselves in terms of answering has been incredible.
I mean, 10 billion trees for a start to be planted.
So Here is your challenge, should you accept it, Mr.
Executive Vice President.
How can restoration investment be scaled globally to reduce SDS risk but also attract stronger public and private sector participation? Could you share with us an idea that anybody in this room could take home and say, let's do this.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Excellency, distinguished delegates.
I would like to thank the government of Mongolia and the UNCCD for organizing this excellent site.
We meet under the theme of water.
I want to make one.
The sand and dust storm is very often a water story that has already ended.
When the lake is drawn down, when a riverbed is exposed, when irrigated soils are depleted and abandoned, the land does not say where it is that enters the atmosphere.
As you know, when a quarter of all sand industrial storm sources are attributed to human land use and the majority of those are merchant hydroulical sources created by unsustainable water use and management.
That means the most human made dust sources on earth, the ones that we can actually reserve are made by water decisions.
Allocation, abstraction, drainage, irrigation efficiency, each is a dust decision.
Tan years before the storm arrives.
The RLC, for example, and Lake Chad are the example that we are.
Is rarely an arid basin without a smaller version of the same story.
Allow me three points.
First, dust is a land and water issue, not only an atmospheric one.
For four decades, we have become steadily better at seeing dust in the atmosphere.
Littering and forecasting are the daily work for the center.
They protect people, the forecaster by giving the early warning and they must continue, but they don't reduce the number of storms.
Only source mitigation does that.
The Kingdom showed this story from its own basin.
We took water decision to pass decades, whose consequences we have spent correcting.
Though dripped irrigations, treated water, wastewater we use, and retirement of unsustainable abstraction.
We offer this experience not as a model, but as evidence that correction is possible.
The economics of favor and we have not made the case forcefully enough.
Sand and dust storm directly affects 151 parties to this comparion.
77% of us 2 billion tons of sand and dust storms enter the atmosphere every year.
Against that, the investment needed to compact wind erosion is estimated at some $13.5 billion.
A year returning $10 or more in avoided cost for every dollar.
Fuel land interventions anywhere can match this ratio.
The industries that carry the cost of this today, infrastructure, aviation, energy, insurance, health systems are natural constituency for this investment.
What this calls for is blended.
Finance and genuine partnership, not public budget alone.
The UN decade on Combat presented as the storm should give us the modalities to bring that capital in.
Third, pacing our shared opportunity.
This does not rest political borders and neither do the degraded landscape and river system that generate.
Where source areas straddle boundaries, joint restoration offers, sometimes something, a concrete, political neutral entry point for cooperation.
In basin where other convergence are difficult, coordinated water government may be the conzation that succeed.
Though the Saudi Arabia initiatives, the Green Initiative and the Middle East initiative launched in 2021, the kingdom has committed to large scale restoration and to the sustainable management of our dry land ecosystem.
The Regional Center for sand and Duster Storm support countries across our region.
And at Cop 16 in reality, less than two years ago, we launched the International Early Warning Initiative for and andsterSorm with $10 million over the next five years through the WO Trust Fund.
Our experience is that the technical solution are not that constraint.
Vegetation cover, surface roughness, soil stability, sustainable water management.
These are proof and intervention.
The challenge is the scale, not proof of concept.
So we ask one thing of parties.
That source mitigation and early warning stand together in the operative text, that we treat the water decision and the dust storm as a single question they are.
We cannot forecast our way out of this every restored wetland, every rehabilitated river basin, every farm that adopt efficient irrigation is a storm that will never for.
On this water day, let us make those decisions with the urgency they deserve.
Thank you.
Thank you very much, doctor Al tani and we will just excuse from the Republic of South Korea, Mr.
Lee Guang Ho, who has another session to attend.
No, thank you very much for your intervention.
Okay, we are going to turn now to the hosts of cop 20 or 31 rather as cop heads to Atalia and Turka.
And, Professor Idaru, I am going to come to you, please.
And I'd love to know what lessons other countries can draw from its integrated approach to land and water, the lessons that you've had in Turka and how could that experience be scaled through GISDS? Professor Adalu, the floor is yours.
Thank you, Madam Burk.
Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen and distinguished speakers.
It's a great to be with you today, and I would like to thank the Mongolian government and organizer all partners for the support in the event.
For Turkey, addressing sand and dust storm is not only about managing their impacts when they occur.
It's also about understanding and addressing their source and the underlying drivers that contribute to their formation and intensification.
In other words, we must monitor sand and dust storms in the atmosphere, but we must also address many of their underlying causes on the ground at their source.
Turkey considers plant restoration an integral part of its policies to combat desertification and drought.
The 21 2024 and 2030 national strategy and action plan to combat desertification is one of the key instruments supporting this approach.
At the same time, Turkey is integrating the concept of land degradation neutrality into its national policies.
It means we should see it is an integrated process that drank resilience of soil, water, vegetation, and ecosystem togethers.
The second important lesson is the value of science based monitoring and decision support systems.
In Turkey, a range of systems and models are used to monitor the certification sensitivity, erosion, reintesion and the changes in land cover and use.
The purpose is not only to produce data, but to identify periodic areas, better target intervention, and provide a scientific basis for decision makers.
Distinguished delegates, as we all know that we cannot effectively manage what we do not measure.
But measuring alone is not enough unless we can transform data into decision and action.
For this reason, we believe that strong monitoring infrastructure must be supported by institutional coordination and early learning mechanisms.
The third important lesson is therefore coordination and multi sectoral cooperation.
In Turkey, STs are not considered solely as an environmental issue.
They are they are multidimensional challenge affecting sectors related to life, welfare, and other things.
And our objective is should not copy one country's experience and apply it exactly to another country.
Every country has different ecological, climate, social and economic conditions.
But We can share our experience, develop scientific approaches together, and adapt successful practices to local conditions.
Turkey's experience can contribute in three areas.
First, science and monitoring.
We need to strength joint scientific research and data sharing mechanisms to better identify source areas, monitor changes in land and ecosystems, and improve our understanding of the relationship between drivers and impacts.
Second, source mitigation and land restoration.
Sustainable land and water management are essential in this part.
Land restoration and ecosystem resilience should be integrated with efforts.
Third, capacity building and cooperation.
Turkey is contributing knowledge and experience sharing through initiatives such as Ankara Started and together with the diss.
To conclude, Summarizing Turkey's approach in three messages.
First, to address SDS at their source, we must manage land and water together through integrated approach.
Second, we must use scientific monitoring and early warning systems not only to generate information, but also guide decision and concrete action.
Third, in response to challenge that snow border, we must connect national experience through a strong regional and global cooperation.
Well, sand and dust storms are shared challenge, and we believe that our response must also be beyond shared science, shared responsibility, shared action.
We have to come from monitoring to intelligence.
We have to come from early warning to early action, and we have to come from fragmented data and institutions to combine them in an integrated way.
I thank you.
I think my might Oh, there we go.
Professor Adaldu, thank you very much indeed.
Okay, to Kazakhstan and sand and dust storms, as we've heard, they don't respect borders.
So how can stronger regional cooperation but also sustainable land management help, Mr.
Damirzanov, particularly when it comes to regional cooperation in Central Asian countries, reducing those shared dust emissions, but also scaling successful solutions? Please share your experience and reflections with us.
You have 3.5 minutes.
The floor is yours.
Thank you.
And can I just ask for quiet, please? The sound is hitting the ceiling and bouncing back to the front of the stage.
So silence, please.
We are nearly done.
Thank you.
Dear Collets, ladies and gentlemen, Russian.
On behalf of Kazakhstan government, I want to express my sincere gratitude to the organizations for holding this event today.
We already talked about that this degradation of land is not just a problem of one country, it's a problem of all the country We know that Kazakhstan today ranks ninth of the rating that has the desert today.
Desert on the Cas see today's event to Plant Williams.
In terms of systemic approaches, as you know, in our country, we have our land code as a foundation to provide foundation for us to take actions and also have cooperation with other regions and countries to cope with this global issue.
And so we also have a budget for a series of budget to have a lot of events and cooration in the next three years.
In our government has relocated around $40 million to provide financing for these events.
In addition, in July of this year, our country adopted an industry politics and law on soil protection aimed at preserving the restoration of soil and the development of land monitoring, scientifically based approaches, as well as a A rules, as you know, in April this year, we also held a regional environmental summit in Kazakhstan, bringing together representatives of government agencies, international organizations, scientific and expert communities.
Its result confirmed the important joint work on the protection of adaptation lands.
Why was the development of the economy a why was the development of the economy adopted flowing rules and laws? Because these rules is aimed at uniting the efforts of countries of the region to restore degraded lands, develop protective Protective to protect the resilience of agricultural settlements and their infrastructures.
We invited the countries of our region and international organizations and financial institutions and partners to share and combine efforts to implement practical projects within the framework of the initiative of Central Asia, not just organizations from Central Asia, but also other regions.
The end of our session.
And before we break, both for snacks and refreshments at the back of the room, I want to turn to the FAO, Director of Land and Water Division.
Let's discuss the opportunities that are available, Mr.
Lee Tang Li.
So when it comes to scaling proven source mitigation solutions, I wonder if you can share with us some examples that your initiative could help in delivering that.
Thank you.
Thank you, Madam Excellency, dear colleagues.
It's a great pleasure for me to join this very important discussion on combating dust and sandstorms.
I want to start by explaining why this is important for a field to be involved.
And indeed, as many speakers already highlighted that sand and dust storm issues.
It's not only an environmental phenomenon and indeed, they directly affect human health, as well as affect agricultural production and our food security.
Globally, we're talking about 2 billion tons of topsoil goes to the air every year, which caused billions of dollars in the economic losses every year.
And in this country, Mongolia alone, livestock loss caused by the sand and dust storm event in 2021, that's a single event caused the economic loss above $69 million.
So for FAU, the message is very clear agriculture is both, highly affected by sand and dust storms, but also it's part of the solutions.
And what the parties can do, I think we already heard a lot about what's good practice from the parties in terms of strengthening the readiness and preparedness for the sand dust storms by advancing early warning systems, forecasting and monitoring and improve the source management by investing in sustainable land, water management, soil management by managing the impact and building the resilience.
A last but not least, collaboration across all the borders.
So what I had contributed to this? F was the chair of the UN Coalition on and dust storms 2020-2024 and continue being active member and we have focusing on translating our knowledge on sand systems into practical solutions.
And we developed guidance to mitigate guidance to mitigation adaptation policy and risk management measures in agriculture and including the database of more than 150 good practice for mitigating the source.
And many of those Examples that really come from the countries such as the Central Asian countries and also West Asian countries.
We also developed a risk assessment and contingency planning approach that's applied in countries including Mongolia, including Islamic Republic of Iran.
Also at the policy and coordination level, we could develop with the UN CCD and the parties the guideline on integration of SDC management into key policy areas.
So if we're looking ahead, we at FA are fully committed to support countries in the four areas, strengthening the linkages between SDS monitoring and forecasting and practical solutions on land and agriculture, assessing the source and impact, and also advancing the early ning and condition planning, promoting sustainable land, soil water management and really support the land and soil restoration, as well as help the countries to mobilize and resources and scaling up those solutions.
So the global implementation initiative of SDS, together with the UN dec on combining SDS provide important opportunities for us to scale up these solutions, this effort.
So we look forward to working with all the parties, the Secretariat and also the coalition to move from the early warning to concrete actions on the ground and from the knowledge to the impacts.
So together, we can reduce the risks, build resilience, and really protect agriculture productivity and livelihoods and strengthen the food security and resilience.
Thank you.
Director Lee Fang Li, thank you very much indeed for that.
150 examples.
Imagine the stories that we could have access to.
And thank you to all of my panel today.
It's been a pleasure to hear your shared experiences.
Thank you very much, indeed.
I'll ask you to join the floor.
No need to rush off.
We have refreshments and nibbles at the back of the room.
But to bring our session to a close, please, I'd like to invite the program manager of the UN CCD, O Chen Kang to formally close our session.
Thank you very much, U Tang.
I'll let you grab a microphone there.
The floor is yours.
Thank you so much, orchesta.
Well, thank you so much, first of all, coming and joining this interesting session.
I would dare not to summarize entire conversation.
Let's swap.
Thank you.
So I have to admit that the conversation was rich in content and substantial in commitment wise.
So I really enjoyed the conversation.
I hope you also enjoyed the conversation.
So without do further, I'd like to, you know, by closing them by thanking everyone, starting from the host government, Mongolia and our DSG, SCAP ES, and the Unit ED.
Also, I like to thank to our speakers and panelists, which was fantastic.
I enjoyed a lot.
And then also thanks to our strategic partners, including UN coalition members and the volunteers their technical support out there.
And particularly I like to thank the Baba Ma, the um Great.
The voice.
Let's just call him the voice.
So last but not least, our wonderful moderator.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Chen.
It's been a pleasure and thank you for staying with us through the session, my lovely audience.
Thank you.
Please tuck in at the back of the room.
Thank you.