CoP 14 is going begin in India today (2 Sept. 2019) and will last for week. The parties will take stock of what has been discussed at Ordos, China…….The theme for the CoP 14 is combat desertification. Integration of sustainable development goal 14. The decision read like “” “Integration of Sustainable Development Goal 15 and target 15.3 into the implementation of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification and land degradation neutrality 27. Background: By its decision 3/COP.13 and recalling decision 3/COP.12, the COP invited Parties that formulate voluntary targets to achieve land degradation neutrality (LDN) to ensure that their LDN targets and the activities to achieve these targets are directly linked to their national Sustainable Development Goal agendas and create leverage and synergies with their countries’ climate and biodiversity agendas. Furthermore, the Parties are invited to use the monitoring and evaluation approach adopted in decision 7/COP.13, including the progress indicators therein, and, as needed, add additional indicators to monitor, evaluate and communicate progress towards achieving the LDN target. 28. The same decision invited all Parties and multilateral and bilateral partners to scale up and facilitate effective financing for combating desertification/land degradation……………………” “ By its decision 3/COP.13, paragraph 3, all Parties are further invited to enhance the implementation of the Convention and Sustainable Development Goals by: (a) fostering national-level synergies among the three Rio conventions; (b) strengthening national-level coordination and cooperation among those responsible for addressing DLDD, socioeconomic development, finance, food and water security, agriculture, environment, etc., as appropriate; (c) seeking to leverage the cross-cutting benefits of sustainable land management (SLM) in national-level policies and programmes relating to poverty reduction, food and water security, agriculture, environment, finance, etc., as appropriate; and (d) engaging all relevant stakeholders………………………
All such meetings end with recording the minutes and open new agenda for the next meeting. What action is being taken is any ones guess. Ground realities are different from discussions in cosy comfortable conference rooms.
Reality: Take for example Djibouti & Eretria. Djibouti, except for the town, the rest of the land is desert. People live below poverty in the rural area. (Chandrasekharam D. et al. 2019. Geothermal energy for desalination to secure food security: case study in Djibouti. Energy, Sustainab. Society, 9, 24-30. doi.org/10.1186/s13705-019-0206-3; Chandrasekharam, D. 2018. Energy and Food security through desalination using geothermal energy: Eritrea. Arabian Journal of Geosciences 11:523 doi. 10.1007/s12517-018-3892-9.). No water, electricity and food. What CoP should discuss is to pump funds to develop the geothermal energy in Djibouti and Eritrea and provide energy to the rural population. ). Solutions do exists. Attitude of the countries providing financial aid should be positive. There is no reason why these resources could not be developed? Technology exists. Europe, Iceland USA …..what are these countries doing?? Read the above papers to find solution to the energy-food- water problems. If desertification has to be stopped, then make use of the existing energy sources (free and environmentally green and sustainable). This will give positive results before the next CoP.