Webinar: Saline Agriculture - Scaling up Opportunities and Challenges The Global Framework on Water Scarcity in Agriculture (WASAG) hosted by the FAO Land and Water Division held its second webinar on Saline Agriculture titled "Saline Agriculture: Scaling up Opportunities and Challenges".

In response to the growing needs of member countries and to help them cope with this enormous challenge, FAO and partners launched in 2013 the Regional Water Scarcity Initiative in the Near East and North Africa. The first output of the Initiative was a Regional Collaborative Strategy (RCS) on Sustainable Agricultural Water Management.

Solar Powered Irrigation System (SPIS) technology provides farmers with a climate smart, cost-effective, clean energy technology for groundwater pumping, and has received an increased uptake by countries in the Asia-Pacific as an alternative for CO2 emitting diesel pumps or electric pumps feeding off the grid.

Climate Services support farmers to prepare for and adapt to climate change. Technology and innovation provide new opportunities for the dissemination of alerts and advisories to anticipate and prevent adverse weather impacts.

WaPOR, FAO’s portal to monitor Water Productivity through Open-access of Remotely sensed derived data, gives users access to a wide variety of near real-time satellite data on water productivity. This information can be used to design strategies to increase water productivity and farmers’ resilience to drought, while respecting the environment and making equitable use of water resources.

Growing water scarcity is now one of the leading challenges for sustainable development. This challenge will become more pressing as the world's population continues to grow, their living standards increase, diets change and the effects of climate change intensify.

The Global Framework for Action to Cope with Water Scarcity in Agriculture in the Context of Climate Change – in short, the Global Framework on Water Scarcity in Agriculture (WASAG) - is a Partnership established in April 2017 and hosted by FAO, consisting of government agencies, international organizations, research institutions, advocacy groups and professional/membership organizations.

The Food and Agriculture of the United Nations (FAO) Representation in the Syrian Arab Republic teamed up with the National Agricultural Policy Center (NAPC) and the General Organization of Remote Sensing (GORS) to conduct technical training session on the use of remote sensing technology to evaluate the effect of irrigation on agricultural production.

FAO-RNE in collaboration with the International Centre for Agricultural Research in Dry Areas (ICARDA), has recently activated a NENA Regional Network of field actual Evapotranspiration (Eta) monitoring. The objective of the NENA ET-Network is to build a common understanding and methodology on Eta measurements in the field and through Remote Sensing (RS) for agricultural-related applications.

A vicious cycle of droughts and flooding has trapped Somalia in a difficult situation over the last few years. Prolonged dry spells have all too often been followed by disastrous floods, jeopardizing or even destroying the livelihoods of many already vulnerable rural Somalis.