The United Nations's annual World Day to Combat Desertification, known as 'World Desertification Day', will be observed Sunday. The theme is "desertification and climate change—one global challenge" in order to draw attention to the dangers of desertification and the importance of prevention. Experts have warned that nearly a fifth of the world's population is directly or indirectly threatened by desertification. Countries such as China, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Central Asia, the Middle East, and parts of Africa, Argentina, Brazil, and Chile are at the forefront of this crisis. In Bangladesh, some non-governmental organizations are planning to observe the day, which has not received much attention due to a lack of government initiatives. Abu Sumon, who is the director of the Wetland and Coastal Biodiversity Project at the Department of Environment, emphasized the alarming impact of global warming this year. He also mentioned that desertification is a side-effect of global warming, citing the discovery of plants growing in harsh environments as evidence of desertification in the northern region of the country. Sumon highlighted Barindra land as having the most difficult soil in the country and noted that the decreasing underground water level is another recent phenomenon directly linked to the issue. The United Nations has issued a warning that global warming is contributing to the expansion of parched land, potentially leading to the displacement of millions of people in the future. The UN's leading scientific authority on global warming has cautioned that rising global temperatures could have severe impacts on rainfall patterns, snowmelt runoff, and river flows in numerous countries already facing water scarcity. By 2080, an estimated 80 to 200 million more people could be at risk of hunger, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) has stated that approximately 70 percent of the world's agricultural drylands are currently degraded and under threat of desertification. These vulnerable lands are increasingly susceptible to overgrazing, deforestation, and other forms of exploitation, exacerbated by the effects of climate change. The UN body stated that desertification is growing rapidly and, despite being aware of the serious environmental and social impacts for some time, this issue has not been given the appropriate amount of attention at national, regional, and international levels.