Experts presented achievements towards the realisation of the Great Green Wall for the Sahara and the Sahel, a pan-African initiative to halt desertification, while improving food security and contributing to climate change adaptation and mitigation.

Launched in December 2006 at the Food Security Summit in Nigeria with a view to tackle the detrimental social, economic and environmental impacts of land degradation and desertification in the Sahara and the Sahel, the Great Green Wall initiative is bringing together more than twenty countries from the Sahelo-Saharan region, international organisations, research institutes, civil society and grassroots organisations.

“We are now all promoting one harmonised regional strategy, ” said Almami Dampha from the African Union, leading the initiative, during an event organised at FAO’s biennal Committee on Forestry, from 24 to 28 September 2012, one of the world’s most prominent gatherings on forestry and sustainable development. [more]