India to host COP-14 of UNCCD.

India will be hosting the 14th session of Conference of Parties (COP-14) of United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) in September 2019, to address the issue of land degradation and desertification.
India will be taking over the COP presidency from China for the next two years until the next COP is hosted in 2021.
India faces a severe problem of land degradation (meaning the soil becoming unfit for cultivation). The Indian Space Research Organisation(ISRO) in its 2016 report found that over 29% of India’s land (in 2011-2013).
Bonn Challenge is a global effort towards bringing 150 million hectares of world’s degraded and deforested land under restoration by the year 2020 and 350 million hectares by 2030.
United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) was established in 1994, and at present has 197 parties working towards maintaining and restoring land and soil productivity as well as mitigating effects of drought.