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| The southern Sahara desert is in retreat - dunes are retreating right across the Sahel region of the Sahara desert. Vegetation is ousting sand from Mauritania on the shores of the Atlantic to Eritrea on the coast of the Red Sea. A team of geographers re-examining archive satellite images taken across the Sahel have found that vegetation has increased significantly in the past 15 years. In particular, major regrowth has occurred in southern Mauritania, northern Burkina Faso, north-western Niger, central Chad, and parts of Sudan and Eritrea. Countries devastated by drought and advancing deserts 20 years ago, are now growing so much greener that farming on the once arid land is now viable. The reverse is not thought to be short term either. Analysts say the gradual retreat has been happening since the mid 80s but has gone largely unnoticed. It is not yet clear why the Sahel is becoming green, the reserve is thought to be related to an increase in rainfall since the droughts of the 1970s and 1980s, better soil and water retention on the land by farmers, or a combination of the two. Back to Main Page |
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