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At Sahara’s edge, old habits protect crops from new climate

Rain is like alchemy for farmer Thialla Badiane. Briefly, it transforms dusty dunes into rich verdure, barren plains into crop-laden fields. 

Here on the frontier of the Sahara desert, temperatures are rising by 50% more than the global average, rainfall is becoming more unpredictable, and droughts last longer.

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As policymakers and governments worldwide scour for ways to cope with the climate emergency, a small town in Senegal shows that solutions can come from those closest to the effects.

In response, hundreds of farmers in Mr. Badiane’s town of Ndiob have revived the ancient technique of zaï, which involves making small indentations in the ground that capture rainfall and increase the fertility of the soil. 

Farmers are experimenting with earth auger drills to make the process more efficient. In one hectare, Mr. Badiane will drill 10,000 holes for his millet seeds. 

Research shows zaï can triple production, reducing Senegal’s heavy reliance on food imports. “It could … save the state a lot on the balance of payments,” says economist Alasanne Seck.

The United Nations hailed 2023 as the “year of millet” because the crop can grow on arid land, can survive extreme heat, and is high in protein and micronutrients. So it’s an ideal way for countries to improve their self-sufficiency. 

When Mr. Badiane admires his ready-to-be-harvested plants months later, they tower over him. It promises, he says, to be a good harvest. 

Rain is like alchemy for farmer Thialla Badiane in the Sahel region of Senegal. Suddenly, it transforms dusty dunes into rich verdure, barren plains into crop-laden fields. 

But rain is increasingly scarce here on the edge of the Sahara desert. Temperatures are rising by 50% more than the global average and threatening Mr. Badiane’s most precious resource to feed himself and his seven children. 

Annual rainfall could drop by 38% in Senegal in the coming decades, a threat to the way of life for the nation’s 8 million farmers. Already the growing climate emergency means rainfall has become more unpredictable, water scarcer, and droughts longer.

Why We Wrote This

A story focused on

As policymakers and governments worldwide scour for ways to cope with the climate emergency, a small town in Senegal shows that solutions can come from those closest to the effects.

So in Mr. Badiane’s hometown of Ndiob, hundreds of farmers seeking to combat those effects have revived an ancient farming technique – with a 21st-century twist. 

A blaring engine resounds across the arid landscape of Mr. Badiane’s plot, punctuated only by hardy acacia trees and thick-trunked baobab trees, as he drills repeatedly into the thick crust of the earth with a giant motor-powered corkscrew, leaving a pattern of perfectly spaced holes. In one hectare, he will drill 10,000 holes for his millet seeds, a planting technique known as zaï

Originally from neighboring Burkina Faso, zaï is the traditional technique of making small indentations in the ground that capture rainfall and increase the fertility of the soil. It’s painstaking work, but a lot easier than digging the holes by hand with a hoe.

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