The World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought 2020 is focusing on efforts to change public outlook on the issue.
Jakarta (ANTARA) - The government has channeled its efforts to change the public outlook in preventing environmental degradation, particularly by minimizing land degradation in the country, the Environment and Forestry Ministry stated.

"World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought 2020 is focusing on efforts to change the public outlook and mindset on the issue," Deputy Minister of Environment and Forestry Alue Dohong stated during a virtual discussion here on Friday.

The United Nations' World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought is annually observed on June 17 to draw attention to the pressing need to curtail the desertification process.

According to the UN data, nearly 75 percent of land in the world had been transformed into urban housing and infrastructure, and climate change has only worsened the situation.

Dohong pointed out that the growing population and development in urban areas had increased pressure on the land that consequently impacted the supply of food, animal feed, and clothing fibers.

The world will need to henceforth change the people’s lifestyle in order to have productive areas to meet the requirement of its 10-billion population by 2050.

Hence, he highlighted the need for the government to educate people to amend their behavioral trait of overproduction and overconsumption toward a more sustainable and environment-friendly approach.

Supply of food, animal feed, and clothing fibers will have to compete with the development of cities and the fuel industry, he pointed out. Consequently, the alarming pace of land conversion and degradation has disturbed the ecosystem.

"This has disrupted the balance in the ecosystem and biodiversity," he remarked.

Indonesia has a unique characteristic wherein its land ecosystem is divided into over 17 thousand river basin areas (DAS) spread across different regions.

However, he pointed out that uncontrolled land use, especially in the upstream regions, to meet the demand of food, animal feed, and clothing fiber, had led to land degradation and threatened forest preservation.

In a worse-case scenario, the river basin degradation in the upstream area will spark hydrometeorological disasters, including floods and landslides.
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Translator: Muhammad Zulfikar, Sri Haryati
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