In its mission to amplify the impact of its country-level interventions, the Dryland Sustainable Landscapes Impact Program (DSL-IP), a multi-country endeavor financed by the Global Environment Facility (GEF), has been working with Forest and Farm Producer Organizations (FFPOs) in Southern Afri...

Agriculture is the backbone of rural communities in Senegal. Agricultural sectors employ over 27 percent of the working population, but this lifeline is under threat.

The project, funded by the Global Environment Facility, which begun in 2018, aims to promote sustainable forest management, enable local communities to use forestry resources more wisely, and preserve productivity and environmental protection function of forests.

The project works with multiple stakeholders – including state government, rural development and environmental agencies, key research institutes, NGOs, and farmers’ organisations – to gain 9.6 million tonnes of CO2 sequestration by implementing 18,000 hectares of agroforestry and ecological restoration in collaboration with around 3,000 farming families.

Practitioners of cacao agroforestry plant a variety of trees side by side—some for timber, some for fruit, and some that support wildlife.  birds and bats in the region are some of the farmers’ greatest collaborators.