Land Degradation Neutrality in Ecuador

The LDN (NDT) Ecuador project aims to address land degradation processes to promote sustainable development in rural areas of Ecuador. This initiative, led by the Ministry of Environment, Water, and Ecological Transition (MAATE) and the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock (MAG), is funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and executed by CONDESAN, with technical oversight from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). Over the period of 2021-2025, the project focuses on preventing, reducing, and reversing land degradation to ensure the provision of key ecosystem services and food sovereignty.

Implemented across three intervention sites, including the Northern Sierra, Central Sierra, and Coastal regions, the project targets forests, páramos, and agricultural lands. By strengthening the enabling environment for setting LDN goals and monitoring, demonstrating LDN approaches to promote resilient livelihoods, and fostering innovative incentive mechanisms, the project aims to achieve its objectives. The participatory assessment of land degradation and the development of a national strategy for LDN involve collaboration among various institutions, emphasizing a comprehensive approach to sustainable land and forest management practices. Through these efforts, the project endeavors to contribute to the overarching goal of achieving Land Degradation Neutrality in Ecuador.

Within the framework of NDT project, the government of Ecuador has initiated a robust and institutionalized process for developing a national Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) action plan. This comprehensive endeavor involves active participation from academia, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and various ministries and secretaries of the government. The plan will encompass the development of national voluntary LDN targets, reflecting a collective commitment to addressing land degradation challenges and promoting sustainable land management practices across Ecuador. By engaging diverse stakeholders and fostering multi-sectoral collaboration, the government aims to ensure the effectiveness and inclusivity of the LDN action plan, laying a solid foundation for achieving land degradation neutrality goals nationwide.

WOCAT plays a pivotal role in supporting the development of a baseline and monitoring strategy to track progress towards LDN, identify hotspots of land degrdation and co-design a decision support system for LDN. This are key inputs for the design of the national Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) action plan in Ecuador, particularly for setting spatially explicit LDN targets. As part of this effort, and based on previous experiences arund the world, WOCAT facilitates a participatory process aimed at identifying the most effective datasets and methodologies for mapping and monitoring land degradation that are adapted to the different local conditions. This collaborative approach ensures that stakeholders from various sectors are actively involved in decision-making processes, thereby enhancing the plan's comprehensiveness and effectiveness. Furthermore, this participatory process lays the groundwork for establishing an institutionalized monitoring system to track progress towards LDN, providing a robust framework for ongoing evaluation and adaptation of strategies to achieve land degradation neutrality in Ecuador.

The participatory assessment of land degradation in Ecuador is one of the main activities of the project. Several virtual workhops were held during 2023 and 2024 and a in person workshop was held in March 2024 in Quito. In this workshop experts from various institutions defined a national strategy to estimate the LDN indicators.