How farmers in Lake Victoria Basin are restoring their landscape and their future

This article documents how smallholder farmers in the Lake Victoria Basin are restoring degraded landscapes while strengthening livelihoods and long-term resilience through CGIAR Multifunctional Landscapes–supported interventions. It highlights farmer-led, nature-positive practices, including agroforestry, sustainable land and water management, and integrated landscape approaches that address soil degradation, erosion, declining productivity, and climate vulnerability. By combining local knowledge with scientific evidence and inclusive partnerships, these initiatives are delivering co-benefits for food security, biodiversity conservation, and ecosystem restoration across the basin. The Lake Victoria Basin experience offers practical lessons for scaling integrated landscape restoration approaches in other climate-stressed regions and underscores the role of farmers as central agents of sustainable transformation.