Drylands occupy 40% of the earth’s land area and are home to 2.5 billion people – nearly a third of the world’s population. People in dry areas are forced to contend with severe environmental degradation and increasing climate variability, as population soars. A groundbreaking paper heralding a new integrated systems approach to agricultural research in the drylands, was published in the journal Food Security this week .

This is good news for 400 million people in the developing world who depend on dryland agriculture for their livelihoods. But what is new?Read more. . .