Desertification [noun]

Around the world, climate change is becoming an epochal crisis, a nightmare of drought, desertification, flooding and unbearable heat, threatening to make vast regions less habitable and drive the greatest migration of refugees in history.

The presence of a nearby desert has no direct relationship to desertification.

Desertification does not occur in linear, easily mappable patterns.

Desertification may intensify a general climatic trend toward greater aridity, or it may initiate a change in local climate.

This degradation of formerly productive land—desertification—is a complex process.

Unfortunately, an area undergoing desertification is brought to public attention only after the process is well underway.

Increased population and livestock pressure on marginal lands has accelerated desertification.

There is no consensus among researchers as to the specific causes, extent, or degree of desertification.

A discussion of the problems involved in preventing desertification and reclaiming arid lands.