Drylands cover about 40% of the earth’s land surface and are home to more than 38% of the world’s population. People living in drylands constitute a large fraction of the world’s poorest and according to the United Nations Development Programme’s Human Development Index, over 50% are in dryland Africa. The drylands are faced with problems that present tough management, research and policy challenges. In Africa, for example, two-thirds of which is desert or drylands, and 73% of the agricultural drylands are moderate to severely degraded.