On 17 June 1994 the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (Land Degradation) and Draught was approved in Paris. Every year on this day all the world communities are alerted to safeguard the land quality on earth.
Latvia joined the Convention on 21 October 2002. It entered into force on 19 January 2003. Whilst desertification is not a threat in Latvia, still like in other Countries of the Eastern Europe Region of the Annex 5th to the Convention , there are unsolved problems here that intensify land degradation. In Latvia, implementation of the Convention conditions is coordinated by the Ministry of Environment, cooperating closely with other state and non-governmental organizations as well as with private partners. 191 countries had joined the Convention till 11 May 2007.

In total more than a billion people in 110 countries are under the threat of desertification. Thousands of people in Africa are left without means of subsistence yearly, fires caused by draught devastate billions of hectares of land in all the world.

Certain land degradation processes are present in Latvia as well – water and wind erosion, coast erosion, overgrowing of agricultural lands, paludification of the ameliorated areas, cutover stands are not regenerated timely and the landscape is depleted. Lots of territories are still contaminated with waste, ruined buildings and abandoned deposit mining sites. During the recent years in Latvia as well significant losses are caused to agricultural production by periods of draught and heat. Looking back to the changes of recent decades, it can be concluded that already in close future lack of measures preventing land degradation could end in problems of land degradation in Latvia becoming even worse. Therefore it is of great importance to raise public awareness on the issues of sustainable land management, to improve inter-institutional cooperation for development and taking of decisions, involving both scientists and society.

Within the framework of the UN DP and GEF project "Building Capacity for Implementation of the "UN Convention To Combat Desertification / Land Degradation" in Latvia", implemented by the state enterprise "Vides projekti" Ltd, by support and participation of the Ministry of Environment, experts of various fields together with the delegates from the responsible state and municipal institutions and non-governmental organizations work on the National Action Programme for controlling land degradation, that will include already active land quality preservation measures and will suggest a new ones.

The National Action Programme is based both on practical field research and on document analysis and discussions. During the previous year agrochemical research of soil is done in agricultural lands of national importance in Svēte Parish of Jelgava District and in coastal areas in Nīca Parish of Liepāja District, thus providing the data on soil quality alterations. The amelioration system of the polder Meķa (Nīca Parish) was investigated, as well, and recommendations for its management were developed. The draft National Action Plan intends to detail more precisely rights and obligations of land owners and users with the overall aim to reduce land degradation, also to develop recommendations on economical and financial tools, application of which could affect sustainable exploitation of land, to activate mapping and classification of soil in compliance with the latest international standards and taking of other similar measures.

A particular number of issues to be solved is related to collation and use of the information on land condition. Currently information on contamination, soil quality, land border plans, development plans, etc is possessed by various institutions. The project proposes to collate this information so, that any land user could be made aware of the available data and could use them. Presentation of such sample data base will take place on 19 June at 10.00 hours in Svēte, Jelgava District, at the premises of Svēte elementary School.

Here, it should noted that land in Latvia historically has been used for agriculture. In 2006 2.5 billion ha that is 38,5% of the total territory of the state were used in agriculture. In total 1.5 billion ha of the agricultural areas were ameliorated. Exactly the condition of amelioration systems is one of the most important risk factors for preservation of the land quality and keeping agriculture as a branch of economics, as most of the systems are built 20-30 years ago and deteriorate even more every year. Government budget resources are sufficient for maintaining in required technical condition of about 40% of the amelioration systems. On 15 % of the ameliorated areas systems are not operating on the designed level any more. Situation with the drained polder territories is similar – for regulation of wetness regime of the flooded lands 53 polders, covering total area of 50 thousand ha, are built and currently most of the polders need modernization of pump stations. Important issue is about unused agricultural lands – the data of 2005 prove that 363 505 ha of the agricultural land areas, that is about 14,9% of agricultural land on average in regions, are not used for agricultural production.
17 June is an opportunity to remind everyone that local solutions for global problems are possible, if only we take part and cooperate for their implementation.

Additional information:
Aija Jakubovska
Education and Communication Component Coordinator, UN DP/GEF project "Building Sustainable Capacity and Ownership to Implement the objectives of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification in Latvia"
+ 371 2 914 4371; Aija.Jakubovska@biosfera.gov.lv