Senegalese PM says Sahel region facing insecurity, environmental challenges

Insecurity is the biggest challenge for countries in the Sahel region, besides climatic and environmental challenges, Senegalese Prime Minister (PM) Mohamed Dionne said Monday.

He was speaking in Dakar during the opening of the 5th ordinary council of ministers of the Pan African Agency of the Great Green Wall.

According to him, this insecurity is reflected by the rising incidents of terrorism which affects majority of the countries.

"The radicalization has essentially come due to diminishing natural resources and fertile lands with multiple consequences such as desertification, land degradation and shortage of water. This leads to poverty, food insecurity, famine and forced migration of youths," he explained.

The prime minister said leaders "have an obligation to find ideal solutions" through protection and conservation of resources, with a view of increasing agricultural production capacities to meet the population's needs.

In this regard, Dionne said there is need to support the Great Green Wall project that is aimed at halting the advancement of Sahara desert. He termed the project as a pertinent solution to the climatic challenges facing the region.

He said international statistics had shown that Sahel-Saharan region was the most vulnerable, with a loss of over 2.8 million hectares of vegetation cover each year.

"This loss of vegetation cover each year translates to progressive degradation of fertile lands for farming in rural areas, something that inevitably leads to reduced productivity and rising poverty levels," Dionne affirmed.

The Great Green Wall initiative is a pan-African proposal to "green" the continent from West to East in order to battle desertification.

It aims at tackling poverty and the degradation of soils in the Sahel-Saharn region, focusing on a strip of land of 15 km wide and 7,100 km long from Dakar to Djibouti. Endit