Report: The war in Tigray is undermining its environmental recovery

This summary figure gives an overview of the study and is titled “Tigray’s landscape restoration threatened” and accompanied by the descriptive text “Since the 1990s, Tigray, a region in Ethiopia, has been undergoing a successful landscape restoration, helping provide food security and other ecosystem services. Our research suggests these gains are threatened by the ongoing conflict. Using satellite data to cut through the information blackout, we found evidence of conflict-driven deforestation and a slowing in vegetation recovery. This is threatening to undermine gains in water and soil conservation, ultimately adding additional pressure on agricultural productivity against a backdrop of conflict and climate change.” This text tells the story of the visualisation below, which is a timeline with four epochs: before the 1980’s ‘land degradation’, 1990-2020 ‘land restoration’, November 2020 ‘war’, and post-conflict ‘?’. There are photographs of a degraded and restored landscape, satellite imagery of deforestation since the start of the war, and two map graphics – one showing the density of woody vegetation coverage pre-conflict, and another showing the hotspots of woody vegetation loss since the start of the conflict.

Report exploring how the war in Tigray is undoing decades of landscape level environmental restoration, with long-term implications for food security. The study also examines the potential role of nature-based solutions in buffering communities during conflict, and in supporting recovery.

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