‘Restore drylands to alleviate poverty’

Experts say Pakistan has the highest proportion of such terrain

LAHORE: Pakistan is the most water-challenged country in the world and it should work towards restoring drylands to alleviate poverty. Restoring drylands will allow Pakistan to battle water security and reverse climate change.

This was the upshot of a media workshop organised by the Combating Poverty and Climate Change Foundation (CPCCF) on Thursday.

CPCCF Chief Executive Officer Ahsan Rashid highlighted that almost 78% of Pakistan's land is classified as drylands, which is the highest across the world.

He highlighted that the CPCCF is working on restoring drylands and combating desertification.

The foundation had already signed an MOU with the Cholistan University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences (CUVAS) to collaborate on a three-year pilot project for creating a scalable model for sustainable development of drylands located within the province.

Around 100 acres of land on CUVAS campus in Bahawalpur have been identified for the project.

A recent pilot project conducted by the CPCCF in association with the University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Lahore (UVAS) has found that grazing of sheep under the rules of “Holistic Planned Grazing”, has doubled land productivity of the pasture on which the animals were grazed, within the initial fourteen months of establishing the pasture. Furthermore, there was 75% reduction in feed cost per animal and 20% increase in daily weight gain of lambs born on the pasture compared to the prior norm.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 14^th, 2019.