Our Work In Senegal

The Wolof people in the Department of Kaffrine in the peanut basin of Senegal have punished their soils with over a century of farming peanuts and millet, and they are looking for new ideas to deal with irregular rainfall, locust attacks, and the encroaching Sahara desert.

The few remaining baobab, tamarind, and bush mangoes are all that remain of a once thriving forest. Even native Acacia species are failing to naturally regenerate. The last of the adult indigenous fruit trees are slowly dying. The Senegalese government predicts that once plentiful trees such as Cordyla africana, the bush mango, will soon be endangered.

Access to running water in many communities in recent years has allowed for dry season vegetable production, which is becoming a primary source of income, but this work continues to lack vital aspects of sustainable land use.

In response to the farmers plight, TREES’ Technician John Leary, began training communities in soil conservation techniques, agroforestry, forestry, fruit tree propagation, and he helped establish four (4) agroforestry demonstration sites.

Families in Kaffrine are seeing our systems approach, and how it can revolutionise the way they farm, collect firewood, manage their soil, feed their animals, and sustainably expand their lucrative vegetable production. John worked with these families for over three years, coordinating trainings with Peace Corps Volunteers. He has been returning regularly to provide training and support.

This project is an intensive program delivering on-site training and planning to eighty families in twenty communities as they establish agroforestry technologies in and around gardens and crop fields