UNDP Uzbekistan

printer-friendly 16/03/2011

Tashkent, February 11-18, 2011 – Achieving ecosystem stability, developing mechanisms of sustainable land use are an important prerequisite of preserving the country’s natural wealth and improving livelihoods of thousands of people, living in desert areas. Involving regional and local governance bodies into the process of preserving and improving the land resources is the key success factor. This means that enhancing capacities of individual and organizational capacities of land use system to introduce new effective methods of rehabilitating degraded lands and combating desertification is necessary.

The “Achieving Ecosystem Stability on Degraded Land of Karakalpakstan and the Kyzylkum Desert” project, implemented by the United Nations Development Programme, the Global Environment Facility and the Government of the Republic of Uzbekistan, invited Mr. Joseph Bellamia, an international consultant on capacity building for a mission to Uzbekistan.

“The mission goal is to assist the project team in capacity building activities in the field of sustainable land management and dissemination of experience and lessons learned” - explained Mr. Bellamy as he met officials of the Ministry of Agriculture and Water Resources of the Republic of Uzbekistan, representatives of government organizations and research centers, engaged in land resource management and planning. In addition, meetings with the administration of Romitan district of Bukhara region were organized. The next step of the mission is developing comprehensive proposals and recommendations on improving capacity building activities in the land use system which preserve and improve desert ecosystems and livelihoods of the local population, and increase effectiveness of combat against desertification.