Helping Niger improve sustainable land management practices
Safeguarding the Niger community against the harmful effects of climate change through data assessments
More than 75% of Niger’s surface is desert and characterized by a strong climatic variability. These fluctuations, however, have led to disastrous implications on agropastoral production, food security, and socio-economic life. With seven drought and famine sequences between 1931 and 2004 and at least six major floods between 1963 and 2012, concern about the populations’ vulnerability to the effects of climate change is becoming top of mind for Nigerien government officials.
Aware of the need to find a multidisciplinary approach to Sustainable Land Management (SLM) issues, the Institute for Research for Development (IRD), with the support of Agrhymet / Permanent Center Interstates in the Sahel (CILSS), initiated a federative framework for research in 2017, to investigate the resilience of agroecosystems to climate change and ecological intensification in the Sahel region of Africa, named SFR RACINES.
To support this process to instil stability to Niger and safeguard the country against the harmful effects of climate change, Stantec was awarded a contract from the French Development Agency (AFD) to compile all data from previous SLM actions and provide socio-economic and environmental impact estimations on Sustainable Land Management, and to support the creation and operationalisation of a monitoring and evaluation system of SLM practices. Ultimately, the team’s goal is to create a guide of best practices to help field practitioners (i.e. water and forestry officers, technical team of NGOs, elected and communal officials, village development committees and farmers’ organisations) establish policies around the sustainable development.
Christophe Leroy, Operations Director for Stantec in Belgium: “We are looking forward to this opportunity to utilize our climate resiliency expertise to support Niger in their work to safeguard their communities against these harmful climatic fluctuations. We hope that the insights we are able to share with them will go a long way towards managing their territories in a sustainable manner.”
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Media Contact
Jorg Kemper
Stantec Media Relations
Ph: +31 (15) 751 1887
jorg.kemper@stantec.com