West Africa, and the Sahel in particular, has been undergoing profound environmental, social and economic change over the past 50 years due to land degradation, aggravated by increasingly severe climatic conditions and increasing demand due to exponential population growth, according to the Global Land Outlook (West Africa Thematic Report) 2019 edition.
Today, more than 3.2 billion people, or 2 in all 5 people, are impacted by land degradation and up to 143 million people could move within their countries by 2050 to escape water shortage and deteriorating crop efficiency due to the slow arrival impacts of climate change.
Desertification is a complex and multifaceted phenomenon that exacerbates poverty and can be seen as both a cause and a consequence of the loss of land productivity.
The Sahel is an area always cited among the parts of the globe with the most degraded lands. This subregion faces both chronic variability of rainfall and strong pressure on arable land. Agriculture and livestock depend heavily on the quality of ecosystems, yet investment in these sectors remains very low.
These two sectors constitute the main sectors of employment in the subregion (accounting for 60 percent of households) and generate at least 40 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product in the majority of countries. Ecosystem services provide much needed subsistence products, such as firewood and various harvesting products, Global Land Outlook (West Africa Thematic Report) 2019 edition noted.
Many soil protection measures have been identified that can effectively address soil degradation, but uptake is often limited due to socio-economic, political, and cultural factors.
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The limited adoption and field testing of prevention, remediation and restoration measures has led to insufficient restoration of soil functions and ecosystem services. The west Africa countries current regulatory framework for soil protection remains fragmented, limiting the effectiveness of policy action at all levels.
Moreover, to avoid these dangers, all hands must be on deck to fight desertification by calling on the consumers and the private sector to join governments in order to save our healthy land. We should note that lack of preparedness for future droughts, in particular in developing countries, could result to enormous social and political mayhems.
What we produce and consume has a land foot-mark
For instance a bicycle needs 3.4 square meters of land. Ten square meters of land are used to produce a laptop. Producing one kilogram of beef takes 22 square meters. However, limited individuals give thought to these day-to-day processes, because the losses are not noticeable or at least not accounted for in the products we use.
”We are all decision-makers because in our everyday lives, our adoptions have significances. Our small decisions transform the world. Consumers should make choices that reward land users whose practices protect the land from degradation.”
It is highly dangerous to reduce the true value of healthy land to its economic value alone. In order to diffuse sustainable land management technologies, which preserve the land’s productivity.
The immense value of healthy and productive land in strengthening the resilience of the world’s poorest communities, which are facing more drought and other slow-onset climate disasters.
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