Fight desert with trees, president says

Vast arid Niger needs to plant more trees and irrigate more land to combat the creeping desert and fight growing hunger, according to President Mamadou Tandja. In a speech marking the 46th anniversary of the West African nation’s independence on Wednesday, Tandja said a seven-month campaign to improve the country’s soil and prevent dunes from burying its valleys and roads had also enabled to keep more than 25,000 youngsters busy at work. A total 600 hectares of sand dunes had been fixed and 5,200 hectares of land reclaimed in the project aimed at replenishing the water table. “This is an efficient way of preserving our environment and fighting against youth unemployment,” he said. In a country where 3.8 million of the 12 million people this year face problems of food insecurity, according to United Nations officials, the head of state also pledged to continue efforts to extend irrigation. “If we want to protect ourselves from climatic problems, if we want to guarantee our food security, we need to farm the land not just three out of 12 months, but the whole year,” he said. The country had a potential 270,000 hectares of irrigated land, he said. The people of Niger last week heaved a collective sigh of relief when life-giving rains began to fall across most of the country, fuelling hopes that last year’s devastating food crisis may not be repeated this year. Heavy annual rains are usually well under way in early July but this year were weeks late. A series of drought years and the after-effects of a massive locust invasion combined in 2005 to create an extra difficult year across the band of Sahelian countries that fringe the south of Africa’s Sahara desert. Niger, the poorest country in the world according to the UN, was particularly hard-hit. sa/ccr/ss