Endangered Earth | Figure for Article 5

The desertification myth?

Dryland Subtypes and Non-dryland Types Based on the Aridity Index (AI)

Dryland subtype: hyper-arid zones | 6,4% of the total planet

Hyper-arid zones (AI < 0.03) are characterised by a nomadic pastoralism that is authentic and highly practiced. Precipitation – from 10 to 50 mm/year – is insufficient for agriculture except in natural or artificial environment. Interannual variability exceeds 40%. These zones cover the heart of the largest continental deserts (Central Sahara, Central Arabia) and coastal deserts of Peru/Chile and Namibia.

Dryland subtype: arid zones | 11,9% of the total planet

Arid zones (AI 0.03 to 0.20) are characterised by pastoralism and lack of agriculture except with irrigation. Native vegetation is generally rare, consisting of annual and perennial grasses and other herbaceous plants, as well as small, narrow-leaved or thorny trees. Precipitation – from 50 to 100 mm/year – is insufficient for agriculture. Interannual variability is between 30[ and 40%. The rains are limited to a few months a year. These zones cover the centres of continental deserts and the periphery of the most extensive continental deserts.

Dryland subtype: semi-arid zones | 13,6% of the total planet

The semi-arid or Sahelian zones (AI 0.20 to 0.50) can support rainfed agriculture with more or less regular production levels. Sedentary breeding may sometimes occur. Native vegetation is represented by various species, such as grasses and grass-like plants, graminiform plants, steppes and small bushes, and shrubs and trees. Precipitation varies from 150 to 500 mm/year. Rainfed agriculture is possible but remains uncertain. The interannual variability oscillates between 30% and 40%.

Dryland subtype: dry subhumid zones | 5,7% of the total planet

The vegetation of dry or Sahelian-Sudanian subhumid zones (AI 0.50 to 0.65) is represented by deciduous trees, shrubs or highland savannahs with broadleaf leaves and deciduous forests. Precipitation varies from 500 to 800 mm spread over a rainy season of 6 months. Interannual variability is less than or equal to 20%.

Non-dryland types: humid zones and cold areas

Humid zones (AI ≥ 0.65) represent 42% of the total planet.
Cold areas cover 20,4% of the total planet. Their potential average evapotranspiration (PET) is less than 400 mm.

Research Office, The Graduate Institute, Geneva. Based on FAO.org.

Other Issues

Issue no. 11 | March 2022

The Uncertain Future of Human Rights

Global Challenges

Issue no. 11 | March 2022

The Uncertain Future of Human Rights

After 70 years of existence, human rights are facing criticism from many sides, some even claiming their fundamental inadequacy for the 21st century or imminent end. The human rights regime, based on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) and several subsequent covenants, is variously being accused of being elitist, Eurocentric and/or imperialistic in its universal claims and remaining blind to local customs and cultural specificities; of being implemented too tamely, inconsistently or even counterproductively by International organisations that are frequently co-opted by powerful state interests; and of being unable to address fundamental societal issues and transformations such as inequality, digital transformations and climate change.

Further critiques castigate human rights’ unmet promises, framing them as a neoliberal smokescreen, or admonishing their anthropocentrism, overlooking the rights of animals, plants or other non-human entities such as robots. In such a state of flux and uncertainty, human rights have also become, to some extent, victims of their own success, being articulated not only by an increasing armada of human rights actors and activists but also by atavistic forces referring to them more cynically. Such inflationary use of human rights, increasingly following a logic of transversality as reflected in the ever-expanding UN human rights issues or the flourishing of corporate CSR strategies and codes, ultimately risks eroding their operability and epistemic traction.

However, as shifting geostrategic constellations, the rise of populism, identitarian politics, authoritarian governments and the current epidemic are all contributing to further fragilising human rights, they remain more crucial to the world’s future than ever. The current Dossier therefore asks how the human rights regime will likely evolve faced by such challenges. Can it reinvent itself and, if so, how? Can we imagine human rights without the pretension to universalism and beyond the decline of the liberal paradigm? Are we moving towards human rights that are more collective in nature or of variable geometry? New perspectives and insights are needed from the legal, social and human sciences to answer these pivotal questions.

This dossier was produced by the Graduate Institute’s Research Office in collaboration with the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights.

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Issue no. 13 | May 2023

The Global Disinformation Order

Global Challenges

Issue no. 13 | May 2023

The Global Disinformation Order

The present issue seeks to better apprehend the nature of this new era of digital disinformation and how it differs from prior eras marked by the dissemination of more traditional propaganda (notably the Cold War) or by the spread of American (or liberal) soft power through mass media and consumption. In so doing the issue seeks to address a series of questions such as: has traditional propaganda consisting in over-selling a model or ideology by means of manipulation and mass media been replaced by the generalisation of disinformation in the post-truth era characterized by systematic epistemic deconstruction and the outright discreditation of any truth claims? What is the role of states (as opposed to other actors) in this process and what tools and operational mechanisms are they mobilizing to pursue their global (dis-)information campaigns? What is the impact of the generalisation of alternative facts and disinformation campaigns on the international order? Who is to win and lose from it? What can be done, notably at the international level and the UN, to counter the noxious effects of global disinformation campaigns and to recreate trust in the global information order?

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Issue no. 6 | November 2019

Endangered Earth

Global Challenges

Issue no. 6 | November 2019

Endangered Earth

Soil is an essential component of the Earth’s ecosystem. It contributes to and fulfills a wide range of environmental and societal functions such as food production, water filtering, carbon storage and the preservation of biodiversity essential to the survival of the human species. While soils have witnessed significant environmental degradation in recent decades, lands have been the object of increased economic competition and financial speculation. The commercial and financial scramble for land has never been more intense as transnational actors and governments such as the Chinese seek large scale bids for land in the Global South that have been likened to new forms of neocolonialism. The consequences of this double tension include the loss of biodiversity, floods, climate change, famines, forced migration and conflict.

It is the assumption of the present Dossier that issues such as large scale exploitation of land and natural resources, soil degradation, biodiversity, food security and climate change are closely interdependent and cannot be treated in isolation. Seeking to explore and better understand the interlinkages between the material degradation of soils and the increased extractive, commercial and speculative pressure on lands, the Dossier aims to address some of the broader stakes the Anthropocene is currently facing: How irreversible is the damage that has been caused to earth’s soils? Have we reached a point of no return? How many people is the earth able to feed and for how long? Are we trapped in a Malthusian logic? How will climate change depend and interact with changing patterns of soil distribution and depletion? What is the impact of large scale deforestation and natural resource extraction on the environment, particularly the soils? What are the governance patterns and technological solutions emerging to address land depletion and scarcity? What are some of the cybernetic loops and mechanisms of autoregulation through which the earth reacts to human interference?

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The desertification myth?

Dryland Subtypes and Non-dryland Types Based on the Aridity Index (AI)

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