UNCCD COP17
Restoring Agricultural Lands and Preventing Degradation: Financing Solutions through Public Development Banks
27 August | 09:30 – 11:00 | MET-04
Co-organised by: United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), Asia-Pacific Rural and Agricultural Credit Association(APRACA), Agence Française de Développement (AFD), Agri-PDB Platform
Rationale
| The RAIZ accelerator at a glance Launched at COP30 in Belém (November 2025), RAIZ (Resilient Agriculture Investment for Net-Zero land degradation) is a demand-driven accelerator hosted by Brazil’s Ministry of Agriculture (MAPA) under the FAO FAST Partnership, in collaboration with the UNCCD G20 Global Land Initiative, and FOLU. Its mission: help governments and financial partners co-design national financing mechanisms that unlock public and private investment at scale for farmland restoration. The scale of the challenge: • Over 20% of the world’s agricultural land (~1 billion ha) is currently degraded • A USD 105 billion annual funding gap remains — governments alone cannot fill it • Reversing just 10% of cropland degradation could restore 44 million tonnes of food production annually • RAIZ builds on proven models: Brazil’s EcoInvest/Green Way (USD 6bn mobilised, 3M ha) |
Land degradation and desertification are driven not only by droughts, but also by unsustainable land use and agricultural practices. Financing sustainable and climate-resilient agricultural transitions —including agroecology, sustainable livestock systems, agroforestry, and soil regeneration —is therefore essential both to restore degraded lands and to prevent further degradation.
Public Development Banks (PDBs) and agricultural development finance institutions have a critical role to play in financing these transitions. Through long-term financing, blended finance instruments, guarantees, technical assistance, and support to agricultural value chains, PDBs can help make sustainable land management and restoration projects bankable while mobilising private capital at scale.
The transition toward sustainable food systems and restored landscapes requires significantly greater investment flows than public resources alone can provide. PDBs are uniquely positioned to crowd in private investors by reducing risks, structuring investment pipelines, supporting enabling policy frameworks, and financing innovative mechanisms that connect restoration outcomes with economic opportunities for farmers and rural communities. TheRAIZ accelerator, launched at COP30 in Belém under the FAO FAST Partnership in collaboration with the UNCCD G20 Global Land Initiative, seeks to support governments and financial partners in designing financing mechanisms capable of scaling investment for sustainable land management, restoration, and resilient agricultural systems. Its ambition is not only to restore degraded lands, but also to support preventive transitions toward sustainable agricultural production systems that protect soils, biodiversity, water resources, and rural livelihoods. This side event will explore how PDBs, governments, development agencies, and private financial actors can work together to scale financing solutions for land restoration and sustainable agriculture, including blended finance structures, guarantee mechanisms, sovereign financing lines, technical assistance, and investment pipelines capable of mobilising private capital adapted to national contexts.
In this context, PDBs play a central operational role. Through their proximity to farmers and local financial systems, long-term investment capacity, and ability to absorb risk, PDBs can help translate restoration objectives into investable programmes and scalable financing mechanisms.
The event will therefore explore not only restoration finance itself, but also the institutional and financial architecture needed to make restoration projects bankable and attractive to private investors.
This side eveent will:
- Highlight the role of PDBs in financing sustainable agricultural practices that contribute to long-term soil health, biodiversity preservation, and land restoration
- Showcase how agricultural and national PDBs are operationalising restoration and sustainable agriculture finance at country level.
- Explore how restoration and sustainable agriculture projects can become bankable and capable of attracting private investment at scale.
- Discuss how restoration and sustainable land management projects can become financially viable and scalable.•Showcase scalable success stories and identify barriers preventing restoration finance from reaching local actors and farmers.•Identify barriers preventing restoration finance from reaching farmers and local actors.
- Strengthen partnerships among governments, public development banks, financial institutions, insurers, development agencies, and local communities.
AFA participated in Panel Discussion I, “From Land Restoration to Sustainable Agricultural Systems: What Works on the Ground,” which explored successful land restoration initiatives, agroecology and regenerative agriculture, community-driven resilience models, and ways to scale local innovations. AFA highlighted land tenure barriers faced by farming communities and discussed the conditions and support needed to enable finance readiness at the community level.
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