WHAT IS OUR GOAL?
TERRASAFE is a major 5-year research project. Our overarching goal is to significantly empower local communities in southern Europe and northern Africa to confront the growing threats of desertification, particularly accelerated by climate change.
This will be achieved by co-developing, co-implementing, co-assessing cost-effectiveness, co-demonstrating, co-disseminating, and co-promoting the widespread adoption of nature-based, technological, and social innovations for land degradation prevention and restoration.
news & BLogs
Community members shape TERRASAFE’s plans at workshops
In February 2025, community members and researchers gathered to help shape TERRASAFE’s efforts in combatting desertification.
TERRASAFE joins JRC’s Soil Literacy workshop
The workshop hosted by the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre explored how to enhance soil literacy across Europe.
Urgent policy action needed on desertification in Europe
A new policy brief from TERRASAFE highlights the growing threat of desertification in Europe.
Our Project
Desertification, as defined by the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), is the degradation of land in drylands caused by factors such as climate variations and human activities. In Southern, Central, and Eastern Europe, about 25% of the land is highly or very highly vulnerable to degradation. This vulnerability is expected to worsen with future climate change and continued pressures from current land use practices.
Land degradation varies greatly depending on the specific contextt, so solutions to prevent and reverse it must consider local social, economic, environmental and political conditions. In a multi-actor stakeholder approach TERRASAFE will actively involve local communities of landowners and other stakeholders in decision-making processes on viable desertification prevention and restoration measures. This collaborative approach, supported by scientifically sound and robust tools and guidelines tailored by the local communities to their specific circumstances, will enhance desertification resilience and lead to transformative positive impacts.


ITALY PILOT AREA
Land abandonment and depopulation

ROMANIA PILOT AREA
Vegetation decline

SPAIN PILOT AREA
Water Scarcity

TUNISIA PILOT AREA
Soil degradation through salinization

CYPRUS PILOT AREA
Soil degradation through soil organic matter decline
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Pilot Areas
TERRASAFE is working in 5 pilot areas which represent the full range of major desertification types and also cover a wide range of land cover and management systems. The principal desertification threats that the pilot areas cover are:

Italy
land abandonment and depopulation

Romania
Vegetation
decline

Spain
Water
scarcity

Cyprus
Soil degradation through soil organic matter decline

Tunisia
Soil degradation through salinization