Sand resources are the most extracted solid material on Earth and the foundation of modern development. They underpin housing, transport, energy systems, land reclamation, and climate adaptation infrastructure. Yet sand is more than a construction commodity. Left in place, it regulates water flows, filters pollutants, sustains fisheries and habitats, buffers coastlines against storms, and underpins tourism and livelihoods. These diverse values—spanning extraction and conservation, economy and ecology—remain poorly understood, largely invisible in global governance, and weakly integrated into biodiversity, climate, and financial decision-making.

Over the past decade, UNEP and other partners have brought several reports, growing global attention to sand sustainability, with rising scientific evidence, media coverage, and recognition by Member States through four resolutions adopted at the United Nations Environment Assemblies (UNEA). Yet on‑the‑ground practices have shifted only marginally: demand continues to rise, governance remains fragmented, and extraction often follows a classic tragedy‑of‑the‑commons dynamic, actors pursuing short‑term economic gains while environmental, social, and long‑term economic costs accumulate. Sand’s dual role as both a critical input for development and a key component of natural systems heightens this tension: unsustainable extraction is degrading rivers, coasts, aquifers, and biodiversity, while contributing to social harms such as corruption, conflict, and unsafe labour.

We have a sand dilemma: we need sand for our infrastructures but also in nature for all the services it provides. The role of sand in the natural ecosystems for the services it provides doesn’t benefit from enough awareness in comparison with the need of sand for building new infrastructures. The purpose of this report is to correct this, by highlighting the dual needs for sand: the sand that we leave in the environment: non-use value versus the sand we extract.