This report from the UN Food and Agricultural Organisation gives an overview of how agriculture and land use feature in 85 new or updated NDCs (nationally determined contributions to the Paris Agreement’s climate targets). As of 31 July 2021, 95% of NDCs include adaptation in agricultural sectors; 95% include mitigation measures in agriculture, land use or forestry; and 38% reference women or other marginalised groups in the agricultural sector. Mitigation measures focus primarily on forestry (79%), with 51% covering crops and 36% covering the livestock sector.

This report by charity Rewilding Britain argues that large-scale rewilding in the UK can support employment in the form of localised Nature-Based Economies, which it proposes should cover 30% of the UK by 2030. These Nature-Based Economies would consist of core rewilding areas covering 5% of the land, and regenerative areas covering 25% of the land.

This report from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations sets out trends in climate finance with a focus on agriculture and land use. It finds that the agriculture and land use sector has received US$122 billion in climate finance between 2000 and 2018. While in the earlier years studied, agriculture and land use received 45% of climate finance flows, the sector now receives 24%, since a greater proportion of climate finance is going to energy as well as transport and storage.

This briefing paper by the COP26 Universities Network explains what nature-based solutions (NbS) are and sets out policy recommendations for their implementation in the UK, spanning the UK’s chance to use the COP26 summit to promote the global adoption of good practice principles for NbS, strategic planning at the landscape scale, the economic incentives needed for NbS schemes to be effective, metrics and monitoring, and involving communities.

According to this blog post by UK charity Rewilding Britain, a survey of 23 English rewilding projects shows that job opportunities on the rewilding sites increased 47% and volunteering opportunities increased nine-fold, compared to before the rewilding projects began. New job roles focused on nature-based tourism, restoration activities, informal recreation, livestock management and education. 

This synthesis report by the United Nations Environment Programme examines how climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution can be tackled as part of the framework of the Sustainable Development Goals, including by transforming food, water and energy systems.

This paper finds that suddenly banning wild meat from diets and markets, for example in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, could put some countries at risk of food insecurity, require an extra 124,000km2 of land to rear livestock as a replacement, and drive an additional 267 species towards extinction.

In this report, charity Rewilding Britain argues that natural regeneration is the best method of reforesting large areas of land across the UK, and that more active methods (such as planting trees) should be reserved for cases where natural regeneration would be more difficult. The report suggests that doubling woodland cover from 13% to 26% by 2030 is both desirable and achievable. The report stresses that woodland regeneration should take place in a way that supports rural livelihoods and engages communities. 

The Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations has released the 2020 update of its dataset on agricultural emissions (accessible at FAOSTAT), with the newest figures covering the year 2018. Total agricultural emissions in 2018 were 9.3 billion tonnes of CO2 equivalent, of which 4 billion tonnes were from land use and land use change, and 3 billion tonnes of which were from livestock processes such as enteric fermentation and manure deposition. Agricultural and related land use emissions accounted for 17% of global emissions from all sectors.