Sahel Region: Economic Activities & Environmental Impact

Economic Activities and Resource Exploitation

Agriculture and Livestock

In subsistence agriculture, the cultivation of food crops such as peanuts, coffee, and sorghum dominates. Some products are intended as feedstock for textile manufacturing. Combined livestock, including cattle, goats, and sheep, is currently in decline. Logging was very important in the twentieth century but is also in decline today.

Cash crops provide little benefit to the local population, as most gains are controlled by owners of foreign capital. Main mineral resources include diamonds, cobalt, copper, iron, and gold. These are primarily exploited by foreign companies.

Environmental and Social Challenges

Desertification and Water Scarcity

The advance of desertification has severely affected Sahelian territories. This process causes impoverishment, reduced vegetation cover, forest decline, and the uprooting of herbaceous species. Water shortages have compounded the problem of desertification.

Food Insecurity and Rural Exodus

Subsistence crops yield very little due to unfavorable natural and climatic conditions, compounded by a lack of capital and technological resources. A high percentage of the population suffers from malnutrition, and famines are very frequent. Moreover, the agrarian crisis is causing a growing rural exodus. This leads to an aging rural population, which consequently has fewer resources to cope with difficulties.

Deforestation and Soil Degradation

In some countries, governments have established reforestation programs to recover cleared forests. However, expected results have not been achieved due to increased consumption of wood from trees and shrubs. Moreover, the decrease in vegetation cover leads to soil degradation, resulting in increased erosion and accelerated desertification.

Locust Invasions

In the Sahel, damage is often caused by invasions of desert locusts. When small crop plots are destroyed by this plague, people are forced to migrate to cities.