Land overview

Land, including soil and water resources, underpins agrifood systems and provides 95 percent of our food. It supports terrestrial biodiversity, both below and above ground, while serving as a foundation on which cities and societies have emerged and thrived.

Although land is an essential biophysical, economic, social and cultural resource, it is being lost at ever-increasing rates. While it takes centuries to form, those few centimetres of soil that sustain our food systems and terrestrial life can be degraded in just a few years.

“Land is a delineable area of the earth's terrestrial surface, encompassing all attributes of the biosphere immediately above or below this surface including those of the near-surface climate the soil and terrain forms, the surface hydrology (including shallow lakes, rivers, marshes, and swamps), the near-surface sedimentary layers and associated groundwater reserve, the plant and animal populations, the human settlement pattern and physical results of past and present human activity (terracing, water storage or drainage structures, roads, buildings, etc.).”

United Nations (UN), 1994.

Land degradation, defined as the reduction or loss of biological or economic productivity in rainfed and irrigated croplands, rangelands, pasturelands, forests and woodlands, results from a combination of pressures, including land-use change, inappropriate management practices and climate change. FAO estimates that 1 660 million hectares of land – an area which makes up more than 10 percent of the world's land area – have been degraded due to unsustainable practices. Over 60 percent of this human-induced degradation has occurred on agricultural land, including cropland and pastureland, with significant impacts on food security and millions of livelihoods.

Degraded at this scale, land cannot recover without deliberate restoration. Land restoration refers to the process of halting degradation or rehabilitating degraded land through sustainable land management approaches and practices. Restoring land increases agricultural productivity, reduces pressure on natural ecosystems and strengthens climate resilience.

FAO’s work on land is guided by its Conceptual Framework for Integrated Land and Water Resources Management, which recognizes good governance, sustainable use and restoration of land resources as fundamental to the transformation of agrifood systems.