India’s Open Ecosystems and Desert Degradation

• Deserts are often vilified as failures of nature, leading to land degradation and “desertification”.

• Deserts are ancient, diverse, and resilient biomes, home to adapted plants, animals, and human cultures.

• India’s relationship with open spaces is full of contradictions, with real estate ads promising sweeping lawns.

• Policies need to recognize ecosystem diversity, reward soil carbon storage, and support pastoralist land use.

• India’s vast open natural ecosystems, such as grasslands, savannas, scrublands, and open woodlands, have been systematically ignored or actively erased.

• These ecosystems are home to species found nowhere else and store carbon deep in the soil.

• Communities dependent on these ecosystems, such as pastoral groups, depend on these ecosystems for grazing.

• Deforestation or planting “forests” on these ecosystems damages ecology, livelihoods, mobility, and local knowledge systems.

• The road ahead should be to study how life thrives without abundance, not turning deserts into forests.

• Reversing degradation in drylands requires careful restoration that respects native vegetation, focuses on soil and moisture conservation, and draws from indigenous knowledge of land management.

• Low-tech solutions like water harvesting, rotational grazing, and protecting natural regrowth often outperform greenwashing projects.

• Policies that recognize ecosystem diversity, reward soil carbon storage, and support pastoralist land use are needed.