Land has always been a strategic resource, but the imperatives of combating climate change underline the criticality of sustainable stewardship as competition between different land uses – including for food production, carbon sequestration and bioenergy – increases.
Land is unlike other resources. While modern societies depend on energy and materials and we cannot exist without food and fresh water, these resources – commonly described as ‘strategic’ or ‘critical’ – are all provided by, or require access to, land. No less vitally, land performs many wider roles. It regulates the environment at local and global scales, shaping weather patterns and moderating the carbon and nitrogen cycles; it provides habitats for millions of species, space for human settlement, and natural infrastructure such as flood plains that protect against natural disasters. Less tangibly, land is a source of significant cultural value, while access to land is critical to human well-being.
While some resources, such as fossil fuels and minerals, are obviously exhaustible, and others, such as timber and fresh water, are renewable, land is more complex. Land can clearly be put to different uses, but there are limits to its abundance. The quantity of land is, broadly speaking, finite. A certain tract of land can only yield so much food, sequester so much carbon or support so much biodiversity. Moreover, a tract of land’s potential or capacity is not constant – it can be exhausted or renewed. Human use and environmental change may degrade land, diminishing its productivity and limiting the extent and range of resources and services it can supply. In some cases, land can be restored, but because processes of restoration typically take much longer than processes of degradation, land cannot be considered a renewable resource.
The multifunctionality of land gives it a strategic importance beyond its direct provisioning role. It has an economic value derived from the resources produced on or extracted from it; these resources can be traded or accumulated. And possession of land can be used to exert power and influence over others. Landowners can control access to critical transport corridors and infrastructure. Accordingly, dominance of topographical features such as natural harbours, mountain passes and fertile plains has preoccupied governments and their militaries for centuries.
These characteristics make land critical to economic development and geopolitics. Landlocked countries with low agricultural potential and limited resources have typically struggled to develop at the same rates as better-endowed countries. Conversely, the US’s historical rise to power had much to do with its abundance of productive and resource-rich land, overlaid with extensive navigable waterways and connected to an accessible coastline. China owes its prosperity to the North China Plain – a vast, fertile riverine area on the country’s northeastern coast between Beijing and Shanghai. This was the birthplace of Chinese civilization: the region’s ability to sustain two rice and soybean harvests each year supported rapid population growth, and the North China Plain is now one of the most densely populated places on the planet. Today, its accessible coastline and natural harbours support China’s role as manufacturer to the world. Russia’s prominent position in international affairs, despite its current diplomatic isolation as a result of its war on Ukraine, is in part a function of its vastness – though Russia’s geography presents challenges as well as natural advantages. The country possesses extensive mineral, oil and gas wealth, but much of this is located in Siberia, where a harsh climate and poor soils make living conditions difficult. As a consequence, over 75 per cent of the population lives in the more fertile quarter of Russia’s land mass in Europe, to the west of the Ural mountains.
Present-day land resources are often influenced by past and present inequalities, including inequities stemming from colonial rule and imperialism.
Land is frequently a contested resource. In addition to the strategic dimensions noted above, land’s importance to cultural identities, political relations and livelihoods has put it at the centre of disputes throughout history. Present-day land resources are often influenced by past and present inequalities, including inequities stemming from colonial rule and imperialism. When unresolved, scarcity of land or insecurity of land tenure can contribute to or be an aggravating factor in large-scale violent conflicts either internationally or intra-nationally (as seen in Colombia and Rwanda, among many examples).
Yet land is not in and of itself destiny; how a country or society chooses to use the land it has is critical to its long-term prospects. Today, many of the same processes of deforestation, soil depletion, species loss and overexploitation of resources thought to have undermined past civilizations are global phenomena driving planetary risks at unprecedented scales.
This report examines the future of global land resources and their use in the context of rising demand for land and increasing environmental degradation, and considers the implications of what we term a ‘land crunch’ for geopolitics, security and international cooperation. The fragility of the world’s land resources has perhaps never been so starkly apparent. Crises in 2022 and 2023 have included, among many: wildfires that ravaged much of Europe, Canada and Hawaii; severe floods that submerged a tenth of Pakistan and inundated much of the rest of South Asia; the worst drought in 40 years in the Horn of Africa; the hottest month on record in July 2023; and widespread pressures on food security arising from Russia’s war on Ukraine. Couple all this with the fraying of the liberal international order, the rise of nationalism, and stuttering progress in international forums to agree urgently needed environmental targets – and to finance the means to adhere to them – and the challenges are even more palpable.
In the report, we study in detail some of the more significant pressures on global land use, consider how countries’ differing land assets may shape their future economic and geopolitical prospects, and ask how these resource and governance challenges can best be met to sustain land resources that are supportive of humanity and biodiversity.
1.1 Unsustainable land use
