
15 December 2017
External evaluation of UNU-LRT
In 2017, UNU-LRT went through a comprehensive external evaluation. The evaluation also included the other UNU training programmes in Iceland on geothermal, fisheries and gender equality. The evaluation was carried out by the Scandinavian consultancy company NIRAS. The recently published evaluation report was very positive and shows that UNU-LRT and the other three UNU training programmes are highly relevant to the trained specialists (the fellows) and their institutions as well as for the Icelandic development cooperation strategy.

1 November 2017
Course in Uganda on sustainable land management, land restoration and linkages to climate change
This autumn, UNU-LRT offered a short course in Uganda on “Sustainable land management, land restoration and linkages to climate change”. The 9-day course was organised in cooperation with the Ugandan partner institutions of UNU-LRT, the National Environment Management Authority (NEMA) and Makerere University. The course was held in Kasese municipality in Western Uganda and the participants were 25 officers from 18 different districts in Western Uganda, who work on environmental issues within their districts.

15 September 2017
Celebrating graduation from UNU-LRT six-month training programme
On 13 September, UNU-LRT celebrated the graduation of 14 fellows from the annual six-month training programme. The graduates come from eight countries in Africa and Asia: Ethiopia, Ghana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mongolia, Niger, Uganda and Uzbekistan. With the graduating fellows of 2017, the total number of graduated fellows from the Land Restoration Training Programme has reached 101 fellows, 46 women and 55 men.

6 September 2017
UNU-LRT fellows present their research projects at an open seminar
This week the UNU-LRT fellows presented their research projects in an open seminar at the research campus of the Agricultural University of Iceland. The research projects address a wide range of issues linked to land condition and management such as assessment of how existing wetland policies and laws in Uganda address the drivers of wetland degradation; effects of increasing droughts, due to climate change, on pest damage in Ghana; assessment of land degradation and drivers of degradation in Mongolia; impact of watershed management on land cover change in Ethiopia; designing restoration plan based on land condition assessment; and use of the arts to promote environmental awareness in Ghana. One of the outputs of the project work was a song by Beatrice Dossah, inspired by her work on environmental art education in Ghana. You can see the seminar programme here.

21 August 2017
International guest lecturer at UNU-LRT
Dr Maryam Niamir-Fuller, an expert on international sustainable development, was the main international guest lecturer at the UNU-LRT six-month training programme this year. Dr Niamir-Fuller gave three interactive lectures on rangelands, livestock and land restoration. She focused on how to move towards sustainability in the extensive and intensive livestock sectors, proposing a conceptual framework model to transform the sectors.
Dr Niamir-Fuller was also the keynote speaker at an open meeting hosted by UNU-LRT at the National Museum of Iceland on 17 August. Her talk was entitled: Breaking silos: The design and implementation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals, where she focused on how different sectors can cooperate on achieving an integrated implementation of the SDG´s.

16 June 2017
Visit from the University of Leeds
Recently, UNU-LRT welcomed Dr Lindsay Stringer and Dr Claire Quinn from the University of Leeds in the UK. Dr Stringer gave a lecture at UNU-LRT on the economics of land degradation and sustainable land management. In her talk she introduced the ELD 6+1 step methodology and shared results from a cost-benefit study of sustainable land management uptake for individual farmers in Kenya. Her talk spurred lively discussions facilitated by both Dr Stringer and Dr Quinn.