As part of the study, published in Scientific Reports, scientists combined field data on vegetation with high-resolution satellite images gathered over the last two decades to identify the drivers of degradation within the Northern Tanzanian rangelands. The study found evidence that sites that are currently degraded are more sensitive to environmental shocks such as drought, but retain their recovery potential. This means that the most degraded sites today were impacted more during shock events, and didn’t have time to fully recover before the next shock occurred. Senior author, Prof Colin Beale, from the University of York's Department of Biology and who supervised the research project said: “The results show that the ability of these sites to recover if effectively managed is undiminished, with responsible community management being the key if degradation is to be reduced.