National Action Programme alignment workshop for Northeast, Southeast and South Asia

The workshop will bring together representatives from 24 Asian countries to build their capacities to align their National Action Programmes to combat desertification with the 10-Year Strategy of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD). Participants will include: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Brunei, Cambodia, China, DRP of Korea, India, Indonesia, Islamic Republic of Iran, Laos, Malaysia, Maldives, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, Philippines, Republic of Korea, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Timor Leste, Thailand and Vietnam.

The UNCCD secretariat and the Global Mechanism (GM) have organized the workshop - in collaboration with the Forest, Range and Watershed Management Organization (FRWO) under the Ministry of Agriculture of Iran - to guide government officials in the practical organizational measures to take to align their NAPs and implementation processes with the five operational objectives of The Strategy. The three-day meeting will define NAP alignment in a practical sense, introduce a new pedagogic tool to guide the alignment process and explore funding the NAP with the integrated financing strategy (IFS) for sustainable land management (SLM). A practical exercise on NAP alignment will be held and the workshop will close with the elaboration of a road map to finalize the alignments.

Developed through a participatory approach involving various governmental offices, scientific institutions and local communities, NAPs are the key instruments to implement the Convention. They spell out the practical steps and measures to be taken to combat desertification in specific ecosystems. They are often complemented by action programmes at sub-regional (SRAP) and regional (RAP) levels.

Many NAPs were prepared before 2008, when the 10-Year Strategy was adopted. Consequently, The Strategy calls for affected country Parties to “revise their national action programmes into strategic documents supported by biophysical and socio-economic baseline information and include them in integrated investment frameworks.” The operational objectives urge improvements in science, policy, capacity building, advocacy and finance to better implement the Convention.