2.1. Streamline unregulated mining operations and reduce the number of licenses issued, by requiring each and every mine to report on its accountability and economic returns at the national level;

2.2. To reduce land degradation [2] by strengthening the integrated protection of water, rangeland, and traditional nomadic landscapes, we call on Parties to recognize and adopt decisions that: (1) protect springs, seeps, river sources, wells, and other water sources; (2) coordinate the use of water sources with rangeland use; (3) protect landscapes containing traditional migration routes and ecosystem linkages; and (4) prevent the unjustified reclassification of rangeland;

2.3. We call on Parties to adopt and implement the principle of a “Nomads' RED LINE [3] for Sustainable Pasture Rights through national and regional policy.” The following areas should be preserved as protected zones of special ecological and traditional-use significance: (1) water sources; (2) springs and seeps; (3) wells; (4) winter, spring, summer, and autumn rangelands; (5) traditional migration routes; (6) sacred sites. Additionally, Parties are urged to recognize the pastoralists' "Nomads' RED LINE for Sustainable Pasture Rights" initiative [4], which regulates mining, industrial, and infrastructure development in ecologically sensitive grazing areas based on ecosystem carrying capacity and socio-environmental impact assessments;

2.4. To strengthen responsible investment and corporate accountability [5], Parties are called on to recognize and adopt decisions that establish and implement a framework for an assessment of holistic environmental and climate impacts of large development projects;

2.5. Parties are urged to recognize and reflect and require development project proponents to: (1) prevent land degradation; (2) restore degraded land; (3) introduce only dry processing technologies; (4) fairly compensate for harm caused to local residents; and (5) adopt the principle of long-term ecological responsibility and insurance. (6) COP17 should enforce the Convention’s recommendation that no state or public funds be invested in any project with adverse impacts on desert areas;

2.6. Establish legal regulations that require the assessment of cumulative, indirect and long-term impacts at the regional level, not only the direct impacts of the project, when assessing the environmental, social and human rights risks of large development projects;

2.7. Recognize the need to strengthen science-policy coherence and monitoring systems in reducing land degradation and improving governance. In particular, Parties are urged to recognize and adopt decisions to establish PRAIS reporting system and national monitoring systems, a participatory assessment system that integrates satellite data, rangeland quality assessment, soil organic carbon and vegetation cover change, and herders’ traditional knowledge;

2.8. To enforce the PRAIS reporting system on national level, incorporated with the implementation of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)’s prohibition of extractive activities in desert areas, and the "Mining in Arid and Semi-Arid Areas: Guidelines for Environmental Planning and Management" (2003) guidance and its related resolutions.

Source:

[2] COP16 Drought decisions; Integrated Drought Management Programme; UNCCD Drought Initiative Ramsar Convention; SDG 6

[3] Nomads Red line initiative for sustainable pasture rights

[4] Nomads Red line initiative for sustainable pasture rights

[5] OECD Due Diligence Guidance; IFC Performance Standards; Equator Principles ICMM Mining Principles