Recherche
13 items
35th CILSS Day September 12, 2020
"The COVID-19 pandemic effects on food and nutrition security in the sahel and west Africa and CILSS adaptation efforts for information production"
Analysis of the social, economic and environmental impacts, the main drivers of change and the long-term prospects of mobile livestock systems in West Africa
This document constitutes the main report of the study on the social, economic and environmental impacts, the main drivers of change and the long-term prospects of mobile livestock systems in West Africa. The study was carried out between June 2020 and January 2021 as part of the implementation of the Integrated and Secure Livestock and Pastoralism Project in West Africa (PEPISAO). This regional initiative is funded by the French Development Agency and implemented by the Economic Community of West African States.
Ensuring peaceful livestock mobility
Mobile livestock production in the Sahel and West Africa is a way of life and a form of adaptation and resilience developed over thousands of years by pastoralists and agro-pastoralists to cope with the effects of desertification and climate change, and to make the best use of the vast expanses of arid and semi-arid regions. This livestock farming system makes it possible to seek complementarities with the agro-ecological zones of the southern savannah regions through the use of pasture and water. In this way, livestock farming helps to provide substantial income for the local population and ensure food security. The N’Djamena symposium in the Republic of Chad (May 2013) and the Nouakchott declaration in the Islamic Republic of Mauritania (October 2013) gave renewed interest to the livestock sector with the implementation of several regional initiatives such as PRAPS, PREDIP, PEPISAO financed respectively by the World Bank, the European Union and the Agence Française de Développement and coordinated by CILSS as well as others such as PACBAO, MOPSS, etc.
Evaluation of the regulatory framework for pastoralism and cross border transhumance in West Africa and the Sahel
i) The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) is a pioneer in establishing regulations for the exercise of cross-border transhumance, a somewhat controversial livestock production system in relation to its economic, social and environmental impacts, and the conflicts of access to natural resources that are sometimes associated with it.
ii) Since 1998, ECOWAS has been experimenting with a set of legal and technical instruments to provide a framework for the exercise of this multi-functional credited activity, which makes it a powerful means of strengthening the resilience of populations in general, and pastoralist and herder households in particular, on the one hand, and promoting social and regional integration in West Africa, on the other.
Forum 2024 2024 Forum on Seasonal Forecasts of Agro-hydro-climatic characteristics of the rainy season for Sudanian and Sahelian zones of West Africa (PRESASS, 2024)
A generally wet 2024 rainy season is expected over the Sahelian strip, with late to average onset dates in the Central Sahel and early to average in the Western and Eastern Sahel, late to average cessationdates, short dry spells at the beginning of the season in the Western Sahel and average to long dry spells in the Eastern Sahel and overall long towards the end of the season across the entire strip Sahelian region, and overall above-average flows in the main river basins of the Sahel.
Informative directory on regulations an agreements related to the prevention and management of pastoral conflicts in the Sahel and West Africa Volume 1 : ECOWAS and central couloir country of trahsnumance (Bénin, Burkina Faso, Niger et Togo)
Pastoralism and transhumance are livestock production practices in Africa in general and West Africa in particular. Moreover, continental, sub-regional and national organisations consider that pastoralism is useful for preserving and increasing livestock production. On the whole, this practice is faced with various difficulties, notably clashes between the different users of natural resources. In order to maintain social peace, which contributes to the promotion of regional development and integration, continental, supranational and national bodies have enacted legal texts and policy guidelines to enable pastoralists to carry out their activities in peace alongside the other economic actors. As a reminder, it can be noted that "a regulation is a legal concept that covers a set of legal instruments in the form of laws, decisions, rules and regulations, and other legal texts that frame a social and economic activity, etc. It is, in fact, about subjecting an activity to regulations”. Regulations govern activities related to the movement of people and their economic activities. To this end, the African Union, ECOWAS, UEMOA, States and communities, through legislative and regulatory measures, have laid down strong legal and institutional foundations to facilitate the movement of animals in their sub-regional and national areas. Between 1998 and 2004, ECOWAS, UEMOA and other partners adopted several legal texts and policy documents to regulate cross-border transhumance and reduce conflicts between farmers and herders, and then to protect public health, in the light of the global health environment (resurgence of animal diseases transmissible to humans). In order to control transhumance and reduce conflicts between herders and farmers, the States have adopted, since independence, laws that have been adapted to regional regulations. Despite this body of legislation, conflicts remain and the management of transhumance is still a major concern in the States and at the cross-border level. In order to contribute to better application of the regulations, the Integrated and Secure Livestock Farming and Pastoralism Project (PEPISAO), financed by the Agence française de développement (French Development Agency) (AFD) and coordinated by ECOWAS, which has delegated the implementation of Components 1 and 2 to CILSS, is working to promote the most relevant texts and also to facilitate their accessibility. The elaboration of the information directory of regulations required a process that helped to identify regulations relating to the prevention and management of pastoral conflicts with regard to the measures to be taken before going for, during and after transhumance, procedures for settling cases of field damage, natural resource management, access to resources, etc. The main regional and national texts have been compiled to extract relevant information to facilitate accessibility, better understanding and application by field actors
Products for capitalizing on experiences and acquired knowledge of PREDIP
CILSS has achieved significant results and a great deal of experience through the PREDIP implementation. A sample of eleven (11) major experiments and lessons learnt have been drawn up and documented using the “ongoing capitalisation» approach, with a view to building on these achievements for the benefit of stakeholders in the livestock and pastoralism sub-sector in the Sahel and West Africa. The experiments cover all the themes addressed by PREDIP (i.e., regional pastoral information service, dialogue and governance on cross-border transhumance, agro-pastoral infrastructures and facilities, animal health). Each of the fact sheets documenting these experiments includes a short summary giving the reader an overview of the content of the experiment and enabling him or her to extract the information he or she needs. In addition to these eleven (11) sheets, two (2) capitalisation notes have been produced. These experiments and capitalisation notes can be scaled up for greater value. They complement the existing body of knowledge on the promotion of the livestock sub-sector. For more detailed information, the reader is kindly invited to read the full report entitled: «Experience gained and lessons learnt from PREDIP implementation».
Regional report on food and nutrition security for West Africa and the Sahel 2024 | In brief
The result of a partnership between the Permanent Interstate Committee for Drought Control in the Sahel (CILSS) and the Food Security Information Network (FSIN), this report on food security and nutrition in West Africa and the Sahel provides timely and reliable data needed to address growing food security and nutrition challenges in the region. The food and nutritional situation is worrying for the 2024 lean season. Even
though the number of people in the highest phases has significantly decreased in several countries since the 2023 peak, the aggregate number and percentage of people in CH Phase 3 or above are projected to be the highest ever recorded in CH history due to the interaction between conflict and civil insecurity, economic shocks, weather extremes, underlying
poverty, and other vulnerability factors.
SMOS based high resolution soil moisture estimates for desert locust preventive management
This paper presents the first attempt to include soil moisture information from remote sensing in the tools available to desert locust managers. The soil moisture requirements were first assessed with the users. The main objectives of this paper are: i) to describe and validate the algorithms used to produce a soil moisture dataset at 1 km resolution relevant to desert locust management based on DisPATCh methodology applied to SMOS and ii) the development of an innovative approach to derive high-resolution (100 m) soil moisture products from Sentinel-1 in synergy with SMOS data. For the purpose of soil moisture validation, 4 soil moisture stations where installed in desert areas (one in each user country). The soil moisture 1 km product was thoroughly validated and its accuracy is amongst the best available soil moisture products. Current comparison with in-situ soil moisture stations shows good values of correlation (R > 0.7) and low RMSE (below 0.04m3 m−3). The low number of acquisitions on wet dates has limited the development of the soil moisture 100m product over the Users Areas. The Soil Moisture product at 1 km will be integrated into the national and global Desert Locust early warning systems in national locust centres and at DLIS-FAO, respectively.
Special Bulletin of the 2024 Seasonal forecasts of the Agro-Hydro-Climate characteristics for the Sahelian and Sudanian zones of West Africa and the Sahel PRESASS 2024
The 2024 Edition of the PRESASS was organized from April 22 to 26, 2024 in Abuja, Nigeria, by AGRHYMET Regional Climate Center for West Africa and the Sahem (AGRHYMET RCC-WAS) of the CILSS, in collaboration with ACMAD, the National Meteorological and Hydrological Services (NMHSs), WMO and the West African River Basin Organizations.
.......Generally a wet rainy season is expected in 2024 over the Sahelian belt, with late to normal starting dates of the agricultural season in the Sahel-Central and early to normal s in the Sahel-West and East; late to normal ending dates of the agricultural season; short dry spells at the beginning of the season in the Sahel-West and medium to long dry spells in the Sahel-East and generally long dry spells towards the end of the season over the entire Sahelian belt; and above-average runoff in the main Sahelian river basins.......
Training module on conflict-sensitive journalism related to mobile livestock production systems in West Africa and the Sahel
Mobile livestock production systems have been facing a number of challenges over the past twenty years, including farmer-pastoralist conflicts and civil insecurity in West Africa and the Sahel. In recent decades, conflicts initially sparked by competition over natural resources have gradually evolved into struggles for control of land between socio-cultural groups, and politico-religious demands that have intensified the displacement of both animals and people. At the same time, we note that the media - print, radio and audiovisual - most often focus on pastoral issues, such as the management of land conflicts between farmers and herders, and access to transhumance corridors. Pastoralists and pastoral households are therefore most often described in terms of this general conception of pastoral farming as vulnerable to climatic, environmental, health and terrorist risks, and as inefficient in the context of agricultural modernisation policies. All in all, these observations lead us to conclude that pastoral livestock farming is a production system that is not only under-represented, but also little-known by the media in West Africa and the Sahel, who more often than not are content to relay current representations and official events about it.
What are the prospects for mobile livestock systems in the face of the densification of rural areas and climate change in West Africa?
The dynamics of livestock systems in sub-Saharan West Africa on the 2040 horizon will be determined more by current and expected societal changes than by climate change. Climate change is expected to result in increases in the concentration of carbon dioxide in the air, in temperatures in the warmer seasons, and in rainfall mainly due to more frequent and intense heavy storms. These increases are expected to favour crop production, but also runoff, soil erosion and flooding. The rapid and persistent increase in rural population density despite dramatic urbanisation is expected to fuel further expansion of cultivated lands and the reduction and fragmentation of rangelands, hampering pastoral mobility. This is likely to reduce the activity of seasonally mobile pastoral livestock farming, but also that of sedentary livestock farming deprived of rangelands and a source of competitively priced young animals. A policy that would advocate the end of seasonal regional transhumance in favour of ranching and stabling, would precipitate the decline of pastoral livestock and increase their fragility in the face of climatic and security risks. This change would require an investment that is beyond the reach of livestock breeders, who would be reduced to working for private investors or agro-industrial companies. The only policy that could sustainably support livestock systems in their diversity and complementarity would be resolute public investment by States and Regional Economic Communities (RECs) in the transformation and modernisation of pastoral mobility.
Access to pastoral resources and regional and local herd mobility should be secured by reaffirming the community or public status of water points and rangelands in hyper-arid zones, but also of non-cultivable land in wetter zones, as well as negotiated access rights to cultivated land after harvest. Frameworks for local and regional consultation should be established, and contractual agreements between pastoralists, agro-pastoralists and farmers should be facilitated. It is necessary to complete, rehabilitate and manage the hydraulic and veterinary infrastructures, the livestock passage corridors, the land reserved for grazing, the lodgings or enclosures for the livestock, with a view to creating a network of infrastructures adapted to the available forage resources, established in consultation with the livestock breeders' associations and the local authorities. A national and international commitment should overcome the civil insecurity that is rampant in many pastoral regions, along with significant investments in education, health, roads and telecommunications infrastructure that would ensure security and the adaptation of pastoral livestock farming to societal changes.
What are the prospects for the evolution of mobile livestock systems in relation to the ongoing political, technological and social mutations in West Africa and the Sahel? Thematic Reflection Note 3 June 2021
PEPISAO aims to strengthen the capacities of States and regional and national actors so that they can develop approaches to secure livestock mobility and integrate livestock farming methods in line with a shared regional vision and offering maximum guarantees for the peaceful cohabitation of different users of natural resources. In order to achieve this ambition, the ECOWAS Commission, in collaboration with UEMOA and CILSS, has initiated a prospective reflection on mobile livestock systems. Such an exercise reflects an anticipatory approach based on the analysis of relevant factors of change for the future of livestock systems. The present note, which is part of this exercise, aims to characterise the socio-political dynamics at work in the region, in relation to mobile livestock systems. The link between anticipation and strategic planning is tenuous. Moreover, the challenge of exploring the likely future of transhumance and consequently the future of millions of people - development actors in their own right of territories for which they are overlooked - is of crucial importance for regional integration and stability of the region and for peaceful cohabitation between socio-cultural groups. Studies, regional programmes and high-level meetings have multiplied in recent years, reflecting both the acuteness of the issue for the various actors and the complexity of the process of constructing political and social arrangements at the relevant levels of decision-making and action in the areas concerned by these problems.