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The Ader Doutchi Maggia Rural Development Project (PDR-ADM), better known as Keita Project, is a development project in
Keita Department Keita is a department of the Tahoua Region in Niger ) , official_languages = , languages_type = National languages
in central
Niger ) , official_languages = , languages_type = National languagesItalian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance language *** Regional It ...
government's Italian Development and Cooperation Bureau, as part of its 'Italian Initiative for the Sahel', with significant help from the
United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be a centre for harmonizi ...
. The fourth phase is being run by the
UNDP The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)french: Programme des Nations unies pour le développement, PNUD is a United Nations agency tasked with helping countries eliminate poverty and achieve sustainable economic growth and human dev ...
. As of September 2009, the Project has cost approximately US$88 million, with the majority of funding (US$66 million) coming from the Italian government. The main objectives of the Keita Project are to increase
food security Food security speaks to the availability of food in a country (or geography) and the ability of individuals within that country (geography) to access, afford, and source adequate foodstuffs. According to the United Nations' Committee on World F ...
and reverse
desertification Desertification is a type of land degradation in drylands in which biological productivity is lost due to natural processes or induced by human activities whereby fertile areas become increasingly arid. It is the spread of arid areas caused b ...
in the Ader, Doutchi and Maggia valleys of Keita Department, an area which faced environmental collapse from the 1970s; a secondary objective is to thereby to reduce the high rate of
migration Migration, migratory, or migrate may refer to: Human migration * Human migration, physical movement by humans from one region to another ** International migration, when peoples cross state boundaries and stay in the host state for some minimum le ...
from this region to Italy. The methods used have included
reforestation Reforestation (occasionally, reafforestation) is the natural or intentional restocking of existing forests and woodlands (forestation) that have been depleted, usually through deforestation, but also after clearcutting. Management A debate ...
and
land reclamation Land reclamation, usually known as reclamation, and also known as land fill (not to be confused with a waste landfill), is the process of creating new land from oceans, seas, riverbeds or lake beds. The land reclaimed is known as reclamati ...
, building new infrastructure, setting up peasants' associations, and providing technical and financial assistance. The results have been to stop and reverse falls in
crop yield In agriculture, the yield is a measurement of the amount of a crop grown, or product such as wool, meat or milk produced, per unit area of land. The seed ratio is another way of calculating yields. Innovations, such as the use of fertilizer, the c ...
s and livestock numbers, to cover large areas of marginal land with forest and productive farmland, and to provide new sources of income from the land. However, desertification has continued to some degree and food security has not been fully achieved due to very high
population growth Population growth is the increase in the number of people in a population or dispersed group. Actual global human population growth amounts to around 83 million annually, or 1.1% per year. The global population has grown from 1 billion in 1800 to ...
. Because of the large area covered, its duration of three decades and the large amount of data collected, the Keita Project has been the subject of considerable study.


Background

By the early 1980s, Keita Department had suffered considerable loss of forest and agricultural land to the Sahara desert.


Objectives


Phases

* 1983: A plan is written for the Project * 1984: First phase of the Project begins * 2007: A new initiative (Fond Local de Développement de l’Ader Doutchi Maggia, FLD-ADM) starts with the objective of completing existing interventions, funding local investments and transferring the management and property to local institutions and organizations.


Techniques

The PDR-ADM operated in: ''reclamation of plateaux and abandoned lands in the valleys for agricultural and pastoral purposes'', ''reforestation of slopes, of the koris banks and dunes'', ''creation of wind breaks and forest areas'', ''control of the water flow in the koris by banks consolidation and small dams''. Simultaneously, the Project has also addressed the social and
economic development In the economics study of the public sector, economic and social development is the process by which the economic well-being and quality of life of a nation, region, local community, or an individual are improved according to targeted goals and ...
by building schools, medical centers, wells and roads, and providing technical assistance and financial support for the creation of new economic activities. The main interventions of PDR-ADM from 1984 to 2008 are shown in the table below (MAE – DGCS, 2008): (Table) PDR-ADM interventions until 2008


Environmental monitoring

* 1995-1997: the Projet d’Evaluation des Interventions de Conservation et de Récupération de l’Environnement (PEICRE) - Italian Cooperation – builds an Information System on Keita in order to evaluate and to monitor the interventions. * 1997: Keita is identified by ROSEL

(Réseau d’Observatoires et de Surveillance Ecologique à Long Terme) as one of the priority places in Niger for desertification monitoring. * 1999-2000: realization of an Information System to Sustain Evaluation Analysis and Planning; FAO-Italian Cooperation-CeSIA. * 2001: launching of Keita Observatory through the Projet d'Appui à la Formation et d'Assistance en Gestion de l’Environnement (PAFAG

financed by Italian Cooperatio

* 2002: IBIMET-CNR studies in the context of three United Nation major conventions (UNCCD-UNCBD-UNFCCC), about Keita potentiality in the Carbon dioxide sink, carbon sequestrationbr>
* 2006: Launching of KeitaLA

by IBIMET-CN

FCS and Politecnico di Torin

in collaboration with the PDL-ADM. Even if the PDR-ADM focused on land management, it has not deeply considered environmental monitoring. Consequently, since 1995, many initiatives have been conceived and begun to address this monitoring deficit. CASE-Ibime

institutions have been involved in Keita for 10 years. Keita has been chosen as a privileged environment in the drylands in order to answer to
open problem In science and mathematics, an open problem or an open question is a known problem which can be accurately stated, and which is assumed to have an objective and verifiable solution, but which has not yet been solved (i.e., no solution for it is kno ...
s in the
scientific research The scientific method is an empirical method for acquiring knowledge that has characterized the development of science since at least the 17th century (with notable practitioners in previous centuries; see the article history of scientific me ...
and development cooperation fields: * Are climatic changes definitive or are they the expression of cyclic phenomena? * What kind of pressure can natural resources sustain in these areas? How and in how much time could the pressure be modified? * What kind of new relationships could be created between man, the economy and the environment in the future? * Which kinds of techniques are the most appropriate for recovering degraded environmental resources and to preserve those at risk? * How can this recovery be achieved in an efficient and economically profitable way ? What are the sustainability guarantees of these interventions? * How to research a veritable partnership in the delivery of rural development programs?


Impact

The impact of PDR-ADM interventions on the environment has been monitored by a multi- temporal analysis of land cover. Changes in land cover are the result of synergies of different factors ( climate changes, interventions of PDR-ADM and demographic pressure). The environmental status before the beginning of the project testifies the negative impact of climate and anthropic pressure on the ecosystems. In 1962, the slopes of the highlands were forested but in 1972 some signs of degradation started to be evident until 1984 when the forest completely disappeared. Between 1984 and 2002, a progressive recovery of the natural vegetation has appeared Di Vecchia A., Pini G., Sorani F., Tarchiani V., Keita, Niger: the impact on environment and livelihood of 20 years fight against desertification , pp. 1

Approximately, the diachronic land cover study shows that between 1984 and 2002 woodlands increased more than 300% (10.000 ha in 1984 to 45.000 ha in 2002) against a reduction in the shrubby steppes of the 30%. This tendency is supported, besides the PDR-ADM intervention, also by the progressive increase of rainfall, which was recorded as from the years '90. Even if the same dynamics are observed in the entire Sahelian part of Niger, this trend has only reached such results in Keita, because of the PDR-ADM intervention and the control of the human pressure on natural resources. In addition to wooden natural vegetation recovery, there has also been an evident increase of agricultural surfaces (about 80%) resulting of the substitution of large grassland areas (decreased about 70%) and of PDR-ADM
land reclamation Land reclamation, usually known as reclamation, and also known as land fill (not to be confused with a waste landfill), is the process of creating new land from oceans, seas, riverbeds or lake beds. The land reclaimed is known as reclamati ...
interventions (about 12.000 ha). These data confirms that the tendency of natural vegetation recolonisation is reduced by the increase of the human pressure. Particularly, valley and glacis are exposed to higher agriculture pressure and the trend is to the extensification of croplands. This happens in three ways: the first one, by restoration of degraded lands; the second is by reclamation of grasslands and the last one by clearing of woody vegetation. The first method, supported by the PDR-ADM, concerns the slopes of the Keita valley and also the sandy dunes of the eastern plateaux. Land reclamation of grasslands has been pushed by demographic pressure especially in the Keita and Insafari valleys. Woody vegetation clearing happens especially in the secondary valleys where demographic pressure was low before 1984 and strongly increased later. On the other hand, woody vegetation restoration interests large areas on the slopes and also in the valleys as gallery forests. This trend on the slopes is particularly interesting where it is not directly due to Project interventions (plantation in trenches), because it shows the effectiveness of the watershed approach and the
water management Water resources are natural resources of water that are potentially useful for humans, for example as a source of drinking water supply or irrigation water. 97% of the water on the Earth is salt water and only three percent is fresh water; slightl ...
on plateaux and slopes. Croplands degradation is also observed, due mostly to
wind erosion Aeolian processes, also spelled eolian, pertain to wind activity in the study of geology and weather and specifically to the wind's ability to shape the surface of the Earth (or other planets). Winds may erode, transport, and deposit materials ...
and sand accumulation. It gives evidence to the fact desertification is still active even if PDR-ADM interventions reduced its effects. In this context, the territory monitoring in the aspects that could indicate a reactivation of the desertification is very important, especially in this phase where the environment is slowly recovering equilibrium.


Improvement of land productivity

The pressure derived from the population growth is nowadays one of the main desertification factors, as consequence the classic environmental approach to fight desertification is doomed to fail if it is not joined with actions aimed to reduce the pressure through the creation and diversification of sources of income for the population. The productivity is assessed considering the main products contributing to population livelihood: agriculture, forestry, and livestock. Regarding agriculture, only rain-fed cereals have been considered. Concerning plantations, only the bloc ones as tranchées and banquettes are analysed. In 2003 the whole project area produced about 40.000 tons of wood compared to 1984 production of about 17.000 tons, with a variation of 133%. The availability of leaf biomass is also increased, about of 57%. In 1984, cereals production was about 39.000 tons while in 2003 it reached 55.000 tons . Vis-à-vis with these variations, the pressure on the natural resources also strongly increased generally more than productions, as demonstrate by population and livestock growth about 50% during the period.


References


Further reading

Keita, Niger
- Official website of the Keita Project
Keita: the lesson of a success story
- Overview of the project

- Overview of the project's funding
Formulation d'un programme de developpement rural integre dans l'Ader Doutchi Maggia
- Original proposal for the Keita Project (French)
CASE map server - KeitaLab
- Keita mapping page
Consultation sectorielle sur l'environnement et la lutte contre la desertification
- General overview of the problem of desertification in Niger (French. Warning: very large PDF file) {{coord, 14, 45, N, 5, 47, E, source:kolossus-frwiki, display=title Rural community development Environment of Niger Niger articles missing geocoordinate data 1983 in Niger