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This tool is intended to help countries evaluate their forest tenure systems, particularly those that facilitate participation of non-state actors in forestry, including co-management regimes, community forestry, smallholder forestry, large holder forestry, or company concessions granted on State lands. It uses the internationally endorsed Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests (VGGT) as its basis. Forest tenure review may be conducted in the context of policy or legal reform, to inform Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) policy formulation, to improve understanding of a specific tenure system that is under-performing, or to [...]

As the United Nations Decade on Biodiversity 2011–2020 comes to a close and countries prepare to adopt a post-2020 global biodiversity framework, this edition of The State of the World’s Forests (SOFO) examines the contributions of forests, and of the people who use and manage them, to the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity.Forests cover just over 30 percent of the global land area, yet they provide habitat for the vast majority of the terrestrial plant and animal species known to science. Unfortunately, forests and the biodiversity they contain continue to be under threat from actions to convert the land [...]

This fact sheet describes the course that introduces the main concepts and principles of the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure (VGGT). It aims to help people understand the guidelines and to apply the principles to practical situations in their countries, as well as to raise the general awareness of responsible governance of tenure of land, fisheries and forests.

This fact sheet describes the course that provides guidance on some of the main issues to consider when implementing a monitoring activity: how to select the most appropriate approach or to identify the best data sources for monitoring, how to effectively communicate the results of the monitoring activity to maximize its effect on policy change.

During COP 13, the Global Mechanism of the UNCCD and FAO strengthened their collaborative efforts to support Small Island Developing States (SIDS) to set national targets to achieve LDN. The purpose was to identify lessons learned from the LDN target setting process in SIDS in order to generate recommendations to policy makers and interested stakeholders on future actions and to consider cross-cutting issues and linkages between emerging and existing challenges and priorities. This briefing note presents an overview of these recommendations.

Countries have acknowledged the inter-dependency of land and water management and the multiple benefits of reversing land degradation for sustainable development, water security and resilience to natural hazards such as drought. Achieving LDN contributes towards the achievement of several SDGs, particularly SDG 6 on water. To ensure that countries reach their LDN objectives, improve synergies between LDN, water security and drought mitigation and achieve the SDGs through LDN approaches, this brifing note presents recommendations for countries, with the support of their national and international partners.

This document provides technical guidance for countries to integrate Sustainable Land Management (SLM) into national policies and programs. It was developed in the context of the project "Desicion Support for Mainstreaming and Scaling up Sustainable Land Management (DS-SLM)" supporting country teams in designing operational strategies for mainstreaming information on land degradation and SLM into national and subnational decision-making processes.

This policy brief was developed in order to enable a meaningful engagement and policy dialogue with government institutions and other relevant stakeholders about challenges and opportunities related to recognizing and protecting customary tenure in the Republic of the Union of Myanmar. It aims at strengthening the recognition and legal protection of customary tenure systems in the country in line with the key principles of the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests in the Context of National Food Security (VGGT) (FAO/CFS, 2012). Also available in Burmese.

Marine and inland fisheries provide millions of people around the globe with food security and livelihood opportunities. Advancing knowledge on how the world’s marine and inland capture fisheries are accessed, used, and managed using various types of rights-based approaches (RBAs) is a crucial step towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and attaining food and nutrition security and livelihood benefits. The Global Conference on Tenure and User Rights in Fisheries 2018 created a neutral platform for a wide variety of participants, including government officials; fishers from industrial, small-scale and indigenous/traditional communities; fisheries-related stakeholders; nongovernment organizations (NGOs); civil society organizations (CSOs); intergovernmental organizations [...]

The Development Law Service has been collaborating with the International Bar Association (IBA) for a few years now, in legal research and capactiy development in areas of common interest. This year, the IBA will hold its Annual conference in Rome in early October 2018 and LEGN will take part in the panel discussion of the Agricultural Law Committee of the IBA. The topic of this year's discussion is responsible investments in agriculture, and what lawyers need to know about the VGGT and the CFS-RAI principles, when they are advising their clients on large scale agricultural land investments in the exercise [...]