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● Drylands are complex social-ecological systems, characterized by non-linearity of causation, complex feedback loops within and between the many different social, ecological, and economic entities, and potential of regime shifts to alternative stable states as a result of thresholds. as such, dryland management faces a high level of uncertainty and unpredictability. ● to strengthen the scientific foundation for sustainable dryland and drought risk management, there is a need for a system approach based on transdisciplinarity with emphasis on participatory research and involvement of practitioners as well as scholars from different scientific disciplines to address problems in an integrated manner. ● a critical means to achieve sustainable dryland and drought risk management is to strengthen resilience through capacity development of individuals, communities, and systems to survive, adapt, and follow a positive trajectory in the face of external and/or internal changes, even catastrophic incidents, and rebound strengthened and more resourceful while retaining essentially the same functions. ● Another critical means is the application of an ecosystem services approach to ensure proper attention to the dynamic and interlinked provisioning, regulating, supporting, and cultural dryland ecosystem services. the ecosystem services approach has proven particularly useful and challenging for economic valuation of sustainable dryland and drought risk management as a basic tool for direct management purposes as well as policy decision-making. ● based on a comprehensive literature review of recent peer-reviewed scientific journals complemented with grey literature, this White Paper provides an introduction to current thinking about economic valuation techniques related to different aspects of dryland management and policy-making. the Paper highlights the challenges that exist, the different opinions about the best way to address environmental economic valuations, and the many assumptions that need to be clearly identified for each exercise in order to communicate the results efficiently to decision-makers at all levels."

Dead Planet, Living Planet is part of the United Nations Environment Programme's work to assess the challenges and opportunities faced when transitioning to a low carbon, resource efficient Green Economy. The book is a collection of short chapters that discuss ecosystem services, global land use change and a series of approaches to ecosystem restoration. The book is testament to the significant breadth and depth of knowledge UNEP has gathered in this area. The range of approaches for successful restoration that have been investigated is very impressive.

Biodiversity is the basis for any development; it is the natural capital, the stock of natural ecosystems, which provide services for any human activity. As pointed out above, the main immediate threat to biodiversity from biofuel production is through changes in land use, but longer-term threats may come from the spread of invasive species and uncontrolled use of genetically modified (GM) organisms. The environmental and social costs of losing ecosystem services can be substantial, with an economic cost of billions of dollars, though often times the price of goods and services in the local and global economy often fails to reflect this cost. Land conversion, which leads to increased carbon emissions, further exacerbates the risk of losing ecosystem services, climate change being likely to lead to further changes in ecosystem services.

This briefing provides an update on negotiations under the climate change convention on REDD(Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation), and their relevance to forest restorations. It has been prepared as part of the REFORLAN project, European Community Sixth Framework Programme contract number 032132. REFORLAN has carried out research on dry forest restoration in Mexico, Chile and Argentina. Hence this briefing has a particular focus on these countries. The REDD concept has now expanded to REDD+, encompassing also “conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks”. This opens an opportunity for carbon-focused forest restoration efforts. It would be wise to monitor national REDD+ strategies as they develop, and offer feedback to encourage the inclusion of forest restoration where this would offer both carbon and biodiversity benefits. Both the major intergovernmental funds supporting REDD+ readiness and pilot activities, the UN-REDD Programme and Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF), have biodiversity objectives and could be willing to support forest restoration activities. Of the REFORLAN countries, all are FCPF members, and Argentina and Mexico now have ‘observer status’ within UN-REDD. Mexico most frequently uses the language of biodiversity conservation and forest restoration in its submissions to UNFCCC and technical documents.

Restoring Nature's Capital proposes an action agenda for business, governments, and civil society to reverse ecosystem degradation. The authors contend that governance---who makes decisions, how they are made, and with what information---is at the heart of sustaining healthy ecosystems. With this as their fundamental tenet, the authors present an action agenda for reversing degradation of ecosystems and sustaining their capacity to provide vital services for generations to come. The action agenda identifies how decisions about development projects and investments can be made in ways that lead to healthy ecosystem services. These decisions, made by local and national governments, corporations, and international financial institutions, involve billions of dollars, affect huge swaths of land and water, and affect millions of people.