Every year since 2005, honours individuals and organizations working on innovative and sustainable solutions to address the triple planetary crisis of climate change, nature and biodiversity loss, and pollution and waste.
In 2024, working on innovative and sustainable solutions to restore land, enhance drought resilience, and combat desertification.
The aims to protect climate-resilient coral reefs and transition coastal economies to "ocean-positive" practices.
The in Cali, Colombia, resulted in a historic agreement requiring companies using genetic data to contribute to the UN-managed "," supporting biodiversity conservation and sustainable use.
Negotiations at #COP16Colombia have reached the halfway point. Here in Cali at this 'People's COP' we need to see progress on turning commitments into real, tangible action. Lots of work ahead, but together, we can make #国产AVWithNature. More information of .
Ugly, annoying, and destructive, are invisible yet pervasive, contributing to 45% of global warming and causing significant harm to our health and the environment.
Worldwide, nearly cook on inefficient stoves or over open fires, breathing in harmful smoke.
Ahead of the International Day of Clean Air for blue skies, UNEP warns of severe air pollution in East and Southeast Asia, urging immediate action to address the crisis and save lives.
Every year, the world produces around 430 million tonnes of plastic, most of which soon becomes waste. to plastic pollution is a concept known as .
Every year, the world loses enough cover to fill Portugal, with much of that deforestation happening in 20 tropical countries, including Brazil.
Puyanawa is the chief of the Puyanawa Indigenous Peoples, whose traditional territory had for generations been diced up and deforested, including by the notoriously brutal rubber barons of the colonial era. But in recent years, the Puyanawa have regained control over their lands, largely ending the clear cutting ravaging much of the Amazon. Instead, the Puyanawa have turned to farming, using traditional practices, like dotting their fields with hardwood trees, to ease the burden on the land.
SDG-15: Life on land - Sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, halt and reverse land degradation, halt biodiversity loss.
UNEP: . DESA: United Nations Strategic Plan for Forests 2017鈥2030. UNECE: .
UNEP's report "" calls for global attention and proactive measures to address emerging challenges impacting planetary health and human wellbeing, emphasizing the need for foresight and adaptive governance.
How much do you know about degraded land, deserts and droughts?
Desertification affects around of Africa鈥檚 land, with 55 per cent of this area considered at 鈥渉igh鈥 or 鈥渧ery high鈥 risk of further degradation. That is a huge threat to food security and sustainable development on a continent whose population is expected to grow by nearly 1 billion by 2050. Through , an award-winning initiative, Ethiopian villagers have replanted trees and shrubs, which are helping to counter desertification. The initiative has restored more than 350,000 hectares across Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Mali, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal and Somalia. It has done so by reaching more than 600,000 households through its training and tree-growing efforts.
Pakistan is revitalizing its Indus River through the , a flagship project under the , aiming to restore 25 million hectares and breathe new life into this vital waterway.
Fourth mass bleaching event underscores urgent need for global action to save imperiled coral reefs from climate change-induced extinction.
Hundreds of thousands of people are coming together to 鈥 by tuning dried up monoculture plots into forest gardens.
