India and a number of countries around the world are slowly losing productive land and soil to desertification. More than 30% of India’s land has degraded and become unsuitable for agriculture.

Desertification, which is particularly prominent in Africa and Asia, has serious implications for food security, migration and people’s health and livelihoods.

India itself has more than a billion mouths to feed and a majority of the population here is dependent on agriculture. How can we put an end to land degradation? What role do policymakers, businesses and individual consumers play? And what practical solutions can we implement in our day-to-day lives to combat desertification?

#WorklifeIndia speaks to a prominent environmentalist, a scientist involved in the United Nations’ efforts to combat desertification, and the founder of an agri-tech start-up based in Bangalore.

Presenter: Devina Gupta

Contributors: Sunita Narain, director general, Centre for Science and Environment; Barron Joseph Orr, lead scientist, United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD); Shameek Chakravarty, founder and CEO, Farmizen

Image: Farmers ploughing dried-out soil in West Bengal, February 2017 (Credit: Frank Bienewald/LightRocket via Getty Images)