Stopping the Sahara’s Reach One Tree at a Time

In Widou, an area in the Ferlo region of northern Senegal, the people are working to plant 390,000 trees before the end of July as a part of a multi-state program to decrease desertification.

1 minute read

June 29, 2011, 10:00 AM PDT

By Kristopher Fortin

Colonel Matar Cisse, an environmental engineer, explains why there is a wall of trees - a wall proposed to be 15 km wide and 7,600 km long from Dakar to Djibouti - being erected in the Sahara:

"'It's better to see it as us trying to make the forest denser wherever possible, to develop water retention, create natural reserves for the fauna, which has almost completely disappeared.' For Cisse, the "wall" image works because it shows that they've 'decided to colonize the desert instead of being at its mercy.'"

FULL STORY: A GIANT GREEN DREAM FOR AFRICA’S SAHARA DESERT

Friday, June 24, 2011 in Worldcrunch

Environment Infrastructure Landscape Architecture Africa Greenbelts; Urban Growth Boundaries; Sprawl

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