Financing Land Restoration and Drought Resilience
Prelims:
Environment
& Ecology
Mains:
GS Paper II —
International environmental cooperation and conventions, GS Paper III- Environmental
conservation
Current relevance:
At
UNCCD COP17 in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, India called for diversified,
adequate, predictable and sustained international finance to address
desertification, land degradation and drought.
Highlights:
India’s Position on Land
Restoration Finance:
1.
At UNCCD
COP17 in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, India called for diversified, adequate,
predictable and sustained international finance to support healthy land
and drought resilience.
2.
Addressing
desertification, land degradation and drought at scale requires finance beyond
public budgets and stronger public-private partnerships.
3.
India
views land restoration as an investment in food, water, biodiversity,
livelihoods and long-term resilience, rather than merely a cost.
4.
Financing
should be continuous, verifiable and connected to local communities.
5.
Domestic
financial commitments are important but cannot substitute for additional and
predictable international finance for restoration and drought resilience.
Blended Green-Finance
Framework:
1.
India
highlighted a diversified financing architecture to support
climate-change adaptation, sustainable land use, forestry and agriculture,
afforestation, and biodiversity conservation.
2.
Sovereign
Green Bonds were
highlighted as an avenue for mobilising capital towards land restoration,
drought resilience, sustainable forestry and other environmental and
climate priorities.
3.
A blended
finance approach can combine different sources of capital for large-scale
environmental restoration.
4.
Greater
convergence between public and private finance can expand the resources
available for land restoration.
5.
Such
financing links environmental restoration with broader objectives of climate
resilience, sustainable agriculture and biodiversity conservation.
Green Credit Programme:
1.
It
enables public and private entities to finance the restoration of
degraded forest land.
2.
Green
Credits are issued after five years of restoration, subject to achieving
at least 40% canopy density.
3.
These
credits may be used once towards compensatory afforestation, statutory
plantation or CSR obligations.
Compensatory Conservation
Regime:
1.
Channels
payments received for forest diversion towards compensatory
afforestation and ecosystem restoration.
2.
Corporate
funding is integrated through environmental regulatory processes.
3.
Bringing
together the Green Credit Programme, compensatory afforestation funds,
private finance and citizen participation on the same landscape represents
a Whole-of-Government and Whole-of-Society approach to ecological
restoration.
Significance:
1.
Outcome-oriented
Finance: Ensures that
financial resources reach the land, ecosystems and communities requiring
restoration.
2.
Long-term
Resilience: Sustained
financing can strengthen ecosystem restoration, biodiversity, livelihoods and
drought resilience.
3.
Community
Participation:
Connecting local communities with restoration finance can strengthen
implementation and long-term outcomes.
Way Forward:
1.
Convergence
of Finance: Integrate
domestic resources, international finance and public-private partnerships
for effective land restoration.
2.
Citizen
Participation:
Strengthen community and citizen involvement in restoration initiatives.
3.
Continuous
& Verifiable Finance:
Ensure financing delivers lasting restoration and resilience, rather than
focusing merely on the amount of capital mobilised.
4.
Knowledge
Sharing: Share
experience, safeguards, institutional arrangements and lessons learned, while
identifying areas requiring course correction.
Source: PIB - https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleaseDetail.aspx?PRID=2302615®=48&lang=1