The mid-term evaluation of the project "Mainstreaming sustainable land development and management” was executed by the Guyana Land Survey Commission (GLSC), implemented by FAO and funded by the Guyana Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD+) Investment Fund (GRIF). Overall project effectiveness and efficiency is low: implementation is slow and few outputs and outcomes have been achieved. The main reasons are the poor communication and collaboration between GLSC and FAO, and insufficient delivery of their roles and responsibilities. Recently, improved communication between GLSC and FAO has generated better collaboration. The evaluation made a series of recommendations to improve project delivery during the remainder of the implementation period.

Land degradation reduces food productivity and security, disrupts vital ecosystem functions and increases carbon emissions and vulnerability to climate change. 52 percent of the land used for agriculture worldwide is estimated to already be affected. Studies indicate that land degradation directly affects 1.5 billion people around the world. Despite the seriousness of the issue, there is still limited access to resources and planning tools for sustainable land management. Between 2015 to 2019, FAO implemented the project ''Decision support for mainstreaming and scaling up of sustainable land management (DS-SLM)’’ at a global level across 15 countries. The aim of the project was to improve access to information on land management best practices. The final evaluation examines the impacts and sustainability of the project results. What has contributed to, or hindered, the implementation of the planned activities? What has been the effect of linkages and partnerships between the project and other major country initiatives?

The Resources, Partnerships, Impact – 2020 report elucidates who FAO is, what it has done, and how it has worked in collaboration with multiple stakeholders in 2019. Also, it highlights the way FAO has been adapting to changes in the development aid landscape, specifically by leveraging different kinds of funds and seeking innovative partnerships, in order to accelerate the attainment of the SDGs. The report takes a closer look at the challenges and strategies that guided FAO’s activities at the regional and global levels in 2019, while showcasing selected interventions that delivered critical results on the ground.

This terminal evaluation covers the project "Mainstreaming ecosystem-based approaches to climate-resilient rural livelihoods in vulnerable rural areas through the farmer field school (FFS) methodology", funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF). The overall performance of the project is moderately satisfactory. The project is relevant in its response to climate change adaptation needs in Senegal. It is coherent in its design and is in phase with the Plan Senegal Emergent (PSE). The evaluation found that the project has contributed to capacity building of institutional actors and farmers organizations on climate change adaptation, resilience and gender equity. Notable results include: capacity building of technicians, relay producers, farmers and agro-pastoralists on good practices of adaptation to climate change, through the field-school approach; the establishment of a climate resilience fund that has allowed to finance micro-projects in rural area; the dissemination of agro-climatic information; trainings on adapted climate change practices at the farmfer field school (FFS) and agropastoral field school (APFS) level.

Forestry plays a minor but important role in the livelihoods of vulnerable population in Mongolia. The country has developed a Participatory Sustainable Forest Management (PSFM), integrating livestock raising with forestry. The project was designed to strengthen the PSFM process, thereby improving livelihoods and the ecological status of forests. The project reviewed the current forestry guidelines at both national and local government levels and forestry planning guidelines for Soum and Aimag levels were approved by the provincial Government promoting the participatory forest management (PFM). There were also advances to improve the policy and legal framework at national level, but lengthy policymaking process and need for increased inter-ministerial policy dialogues, among other issues, have challenged the full achievement of this outcome.

Very little has been written on the economy of East Timor since the country’s independence in 2002, and no comprehensive account exists of the economic history of the country. The former cannot be properly understood without a knowledge of the historical process that created the present-day situation. This research monograph is the first book to combine a historical analysis of the creation and development of the economy of East Timor from the earliest times to the present, and an analysis of the main contemporary problems facing the East Timorese economy. Volume II offers a detailed analysis of the economy of East Timor, of politics, fiscal policy and social progress. It pays particular attention to structural problems: employment generation and the lack of a modern sector, the modernization of agriculture and the management of the oil deposits in the Timor Sea. The first volume, available separately, considers East Timor from a chronological perspective, as a Portuguese colony, and a country occupied by Indonesia up to national independence in 2002. This book will appeal to economists, political scientists and social scientists in general as well as practitioners, since it focuses on down-to-earth problems that need to be solved for the economy to develop. The book can also be read by students both at the undergraduate and graduate levels and could be used for case studies in development.

The Central Highlands are an important area in Sri Lanka that generates important ecosystem services for the country. However, the area suffers from land degradation and related issues. The project “Rehabilitation of Degraded Agricultural Lands in Kandy, Badulla and Nuwara Eliya Districts in the Central Highlands” (GCP/SRL/063/GFF) was designed to tackle the above-mentioned challenges. The terminal evaluation found that the project generated relevant planned and unplanned outcomes including spontaneous dissemination of project models (e.g. tea smallholding productivity improvement) and demand for replication and use of Participatory Land Use Development Plans (PLUDP) as national model for village level resource planning. Positive gender results and lateral dissemination of technology and strengthened peer-to-peer learning were evaluation findings. The recommendations include: i) the project should catalyse and showcase their knowledge management, training and outreach related innovations post COVID-19; ii) future projects trying to innovate conservation approaches beyond the traditional ones should receive dedicated, embedded technical advisory support; iii) long-term and innovative financing should be embedded into sustainable land use models in project and pilot design; and iv) land use planning and development planning should be connected.

This report aims to highlight the current strengths of the institutional DRR system for agriculture in Armenia as well as indicate existing gaps and capacity needs to further enhance it. A comprehensive assessment is conducted, which includes a general overview of the country’s agricultural sector and outlines the most frequent natural hazards that are impacting the sector. It is followed by an analysis of the existing legal, policy and institutional structure and discusses various components of the system, including e.g. the functioning of early warning systems, assessments of disaster risks, post-disaster needs assessments, including damages and losses assessments and the availability of agricultural insurance for farmers. It concludes by providing recommendations for capacity building interventions to strengthen the current system to reduce the adverse impacts of natural hazards, in particular, floods, landslides and droughts, and climate change on agriculture in Armenia.

Small Island Developing States (SIDS) are continuously under the threat from the adverse effects of climate change and land degradation impacts. Land degradation directly increases CO2 emissions, contributing to climate change and vice versa. The LDN Target Setting Programme (TSP) of the UNCCD has substantially contributed to land degradation receiving the policy attention and securing political commitments for addressing the obvious and immediate threats of climate change and natural disasters to SIDS. It has strengthened the availability and accessibility of data for assessing land degradation and enabled SIDS to set specific measurable science-based targets. LDN provides the framework for the sustainable development of human settlements in SIDS through policy, planning, design and regulatory instruments.

The project's specific objective is to “evaluate, adapt, and implement relevant best practices derived from the successful management of Huangshan National Scenic Reserve to strengthen and upgrade the existing municipal system of protected areas (PAs).” This is to be achieved by adopting a tiered, sequential approach applied to different classes of Nature Reserves (NR) grouped to best benefit from project-supported activities in a cost-effective manner. This MTE is being conducted for the purposes of both accountability and learning of GEF, GCU, FAO, and other participating institutions. This MTE documents important lessons to guide the remaining phase of the project and will serve as an input to improve its implementation. Likewise, it will present strategic recommendations in order to ensure that all the planned results of the project will be achieved if considered realistic. Project code: GCP/CPR/049/GFF GEF ID: 4526