00:00This is the one that works with our mutual understanding.
00:11This is a matter of time,
00:15in the coming months.
00:15I would like to thank you for this event,
00:18and for a second time.
00:35Conference of Parties or COP17 Conference of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification
00:41held in Mongolia was another in the series of attempts to reverse the process of land
00:46degradation which has already affected 40 percent of soil on earth and more than 3.2 billion people.
00:52The theme was recovery of rangelands which support 2 billion people including 500 million
00:57herders or pastoralists. The host country Mongolia and the United Nations have appealed to 197
01:03delegations gathered here in Ulan Bator to use more than 400 scheduled events to find really
01:09tangible solutions for land degradation because recent wildfires and heat waves around the world
01:15show us that the climate change is accelerating. COP17 set sights on action plans for land
01:21restoration and finding funds to support them but also raising awareness that many acute problems
01:26like migrations are actually the result of land degradation. Once your land is degraded you will
01:33not be able to plant and you will have both food and water security but you will have also migration
01:38and displacement. So here the people are not given the choice whether they're moving from their land
01:44yes or no but they don't have what to sustain their livelihood and what to make it resilient.
01:49The convention estimates that inaction on land costs the world almost 900 billion dollars a year
01:55while investment in healthy land could generate up to 1.8 trillion through food production water
02:01provision and carbon storing. Yet the investment so far remains modest. And if you look at how much money
02:07money goes into artificial intelligence for that matter it is the same amount that goes into climate
02:12financing 2 trillion dollars a year but when you double click on climate financing less than 3% goes to
02:21land and
02:21water. It is way under invested. And here this white paper actually puts forward the reasons why businesses
02:28can actually invest into soil and water but you bring returns every dollar invested into soil will give
02:35you at least four to thirty dollars in exchange. The ministerial dialogue on innovative financial
02:40mechanisms brought together some of the large financial institutions such as the World Bank Group,
02:46Development Banks of Asia, Africa, the Islamic World, European Investment Bank, GEF and the Climate Fund.
02:52They announced 1.3 billion dollars of financing for land restoration and drought resilience across 23
02:59countries on five continents. Several countries including host Mongolia announced new platforms for
03:05attracting private investment into land. One billion three plantation initiative has been done by Mongolian
03:13president and it is really successfully going on. Offering all these corporate companies that you can invest
03:21like 1% of your taxable income for this range lands or the green transition you know for the countries
03:28and you can
03:30decide and you can implement the project by yourself not the involved with from the government. Even if cops including
03:37this one fall short of reaching a legally binding global plans they are considered to be successful as they bring
03:43countries to present national agendas and make pledges. In Riyadh we have 35 initiatives and the Riyadh Action Agenda and
03:50we
03:50continued after that in 2025-2026 and we came here to Mongolia and now we have 200 or to be
03:59exact 198 initiatives under Riyadh Action Agenda.
04:04During 12 days in Ulaanbaatar alliances were forged like the one between China and the League of Arab States
04:10who made a joint five-year plan of cooperation to restore land. Countries shared experience in fighting desertification.
04:34In the green zone of COP17 open to the general public policy met real life. The people could come,
04:45meet experts, scientists, scholars, city planners, even school projects and learn how desertification
04:51influences their lives. Also get a glimpse of Mongolian rich culture and tradition.
