Restoring Rangeland Soil Health: Can It Mitigate Climate Change, Increase Food Security and Reduce Poverty and Conflict?.

Increasingly hopeful claims are being made about the possible impacts of rangeland restoration and management systems on climate change mitigation, food security, and reducing poverty and conflict. The first section of this two-part paper provides an assessment of the supporting evidence for these claims, focusing on the strategies that have received the greatest attention in the popular press. We conclude that many of these systems can make significant contributions to a number of societal objectives, but the claims are often overstated and oversold. For example a TED talk with over 3 million views claims that a particular grazing system can reverse climate change. Other slightly less optimistic claims also fail to consider biophysical limits on carbon sequestration and the challenges presented by ecological thresholds, particularly in drylands. Agroforestry systems can only increase productivity where soil and climate conditions support tree production. Runoff harvesting systems can only increase plant available water where significant runoff occurs, and where the soil is sufficiently stable to support the structures, and labor is available to maintain them as necessary. The second section presents a strategy described in a forthcoming UNEP International Resource Panel report. This strategy is designed to ensure that (a) successful management and restoration systems can be adapted and targeted to maximize impacts on desired outcomes, and (b) new restoration and management systems can be rapidly and rigorously tested. This strategy builds on the fundamental principles of land evaluation that have thus far helped the United States avoid another Dust Bowl, while integrating ecosystem resilience and a more holistic understanding of the broad range of ecosystem services required by society. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of the potential for mobile apps and cloud computing to help individual managers apply this knowledge to their own land.