In the past 50 years, the population of the Central Asia region has tripled. With the need to feed a larger number of people amid increasingly limited water resources and highly vulnerable climatic conditions, the region faces serious food security challenges.

A newly launched regional project from FAO and the Global Environment Facility aims to tackle these challenges in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.

Climate change negatively impacts the productivity of farmland and pasture land in all countries of the region. Grasslands, for example, are at risk of desertification due to higher temperatures and decreasing rainfall, which would directly impact livestock productivity.