Blog

In order for USAID to have maximum impact in confronting the most urgent demands of the climate crisis, improved participation at all levels is key. Thus, an increased emphasis on working with Indigenous Peoples and local communities is critical to USAID’s climate efforts.

• 03/03/2022
• Sophie Schrader

Inside the protected area of Menabe Antimena is Madagascar's largest dry forest--45% of which has disappeared in only the last 10 years due to massive deforestation, fires, migration, illegal maize cultivation, corruption and unscrupulous private interests. Menabe Antimena is one of the many critical ecosystems that the USAID Hay Tao project is working to protect.

• 08/26/2021
• Mihary Randrianarivelo

In July 2019, USAID launched a new Environmental and Natural Resource Management (ENRM) Framework to coordinate, unify, and elevate environmental and natural resource management across the Agency. The Framework outlines a unifying vision to address emerging challenges and the most critical threats to the environment and development, and serves as a guiding document for cross-sectoral investments in environmental and natural resource management.

• 12/07/2020
• Christine Chumbler

This is the second of three blogs examining the issues of the COVID-19 pandemic for sustainable landscape programs. The first blog discusses how deforestation and forest fragmentation can increase the likelihood of future pandemics.

• 11/24/2020
• Eric Haxthausen

The end of USAID’s five-year LESTARI project (2015-2020) in Indonesia is an opportunity to recognize USAID’s collective achievements with the Government of Indonesia in reducing greenhouse gas emissions from land use in both biodiverse and carbon-rich landscapes.

• 11/02/2020
• Tedi Rabold

The ways we use land—for instance, agriculture, forestry, urban development, or ecosystem protection—has long-term impacts on global climate change. Approximately one quarter of net global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions come directly from land use (like agriculture) and land use change (like deforestation).

• 09/22/2020
• Noel Gurwick, Isabela Barriga, Julia Bradley-Cook

In 2015, India set an ambitious goal of creating a sink of as much as 3 billion tons of carbon by 2030. To do that, the country will need to increase tree cover by 10 million hectares and enhance forest stocks on a further 10 million hectares—about one-quarter the total area of California—which is a huge task.

• 07/15/2020
• Christine Chumbler

Long-term changes in climate and wildlife habitat can pose significant effects on human health and increase the risk of infectious diseases like the coronavirus (COVID-19). Several of the roots of climate change can increase the risk of pandemics; for example, deforestation increasingly places humans and animals in contact, which enables pathogens from animals to spillover to humans.

• 07/08/2020
• Isabela Barriga

Yao Ahou, a cocoa farmer in Côte d’Ivoire, is well aware of the challenge she faces in farming for the core ingredient for the world’s chocolate. “For us cocoa farmers, our problem is climate change. When we expect the rains, it is the sun that comes up, and when the sun is expected, it is the rains that come.

• 05/26/2020
• Ethan Budiansky

Worldwide, local communities in the tropics and subtropics control 22 percent of the forest carbon in those regions. For several decades, development organizations have promoted sustainable forest use approaches to help communities manage these forests. One such approach is the establishment of community-based forestry enterprises (CBFEs) that sell forest products or services.

• 05/19/2020
• Mark Donahue, Ian Deshmukh

As one of the world’s most biodiverse countries, Peru has an abundance of natural resources that have represented natural wealth throughout the nation’s history. However, this richness is not often fully understood and has been unsustainably managed as a result. Over the past decade, an increasing turn toward a green economy has helped shift the way that Peru’s natural resources are viewed.

• 04/24/2020
• Paloma Vásquez

“The water is pushing very hard on our islands and communities,” recounted the Bonthe Deputy Mayor, during a recent meeting with USAID staff in the southwestern district of Sierra Leone. His description captures the profound impacts that climate change is having on coastal communities.

• 04/29/2019
• Julia Bradley-Cook

Integrating biodiversity and sustainable landscapes objectives in development programming can increase the sustainability of interventions, amplify results and reduce costs. ‘Integrating Biodiversity and Sustainable Landscapes in USAID Programming’ highlights these and other key considerations for USAID staff and development practitioners interested in connections between biodiversity and sustainable landscapes priorities.

• 04/23/2019
• Catherine Wahlen, Jennifer Kane

A new land cover tool originally developed for southeast Asia is now being expanded globally. “Land cover mapping in the Lower Mekong has been challenging in the past, based primarily on outdated maps using different criteria,” said Dr. David Saah, Professor at the University of San Francisco and Managing Principal of the Spatial Informatics Group (SIG).

• 04/10/2019
• Devrin Weiss, Leah Kucera

Do you work on a project or activity that is increasing climate resilience or reducing carbon emissions while conserving biodiversity? Have you collaborated with colleagues across USAID to design a project or activity that has biodiversity outcomes and tackles development challenges across multiple programming areas?

• 04/04/2019
• Jennifer Kane, Catherine Wahlen