The 15th United Nations Conference of the Parties (COP15) on desertification is in full swing in Abidjan, Ivory Coast. On the side-lines of this event, the Canadian mining company Endeavour Mining, based in London, UK, has announced funding of 40 million CFA francs (more than 60,000 euros) in 2022, for the implementation of a reforestation project covering 100 hectares in the Bakel department on the border with Mali and Mauritania.
The funds are granted to the Senegalese Agency for Reforestation and the Great Green Wall via the Endeavour Foundation and Sabodala Gold Operations (SGO), the Endeavour subsidiary that operates the Sabodala-Massawa gold mine in the Kédougou region. This support is part of Endeavour’s commitment to sustainable development and contributes to the realisation of the Great Green Wall project in the Sahel.
Halting the advance of the desert
Initiated by the African Union (AU), this project aims to combat desertification in Africa by restoring 100 million hectares of degraded land through a large vegetation barrier over 8,000 km Nsouth of the Sahara Desert through Burkina Faso, Chad, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal and Sudan.
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This strip of vegetation will link Dakar to Djibouti and will cover more than 117,000 km2 or 11.7 million hectares. Several organisations are involved in its implementation, including the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAFT) and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS).
Benoit-Ivan Wansi