While each year the celebrations of Desertification and Drought Day are hosted by one country officially, all nations have their own activities to reflect on and inspire action for drought. UNCCD asked us to develop the theme for this year’s Desertification and Drought Day (June 17th, 2022) as well as a series of graphic assets that all countries could easily use to promote their own activities and spread the word on social media channels, as well as traditional ad spaces.

After analyzing some of the flagship publications of UNCCD and reviewing past themes of Desertification and Drought day, our team developed a theme that conveyed optimism and hope, focused on drought resilience and collective action, and expressed the idea in a human, non-technical way: “Rising from drought together”, in Spanish, “Superando Juntos las Sequías”, or in French, “Tous Ensemble pour Vaincre la Sécheresse”.

The spirit of the theme was then reflected through a logo and series of graphic assets that included posters, banners, social media graphics, animations, and postcards in different languages that focused on drought resilience, which could easily be used by any country to promote their own DDD activities. We also developed an accompanying visual identity manual so countries could know how to and how not to use these materials.

The theme as well as the graphic assets were used in the lead up, during, and after Desertification and Drought Day not only in Spain, the host country of the activities that year, but all over the world.

The theme was used in various speeches from high-level staff from UNCCD, as well as political officers of various governments to raise awareness about the importance of taking action to be more drought resilience.