48 Time September 23, 2019
something she values instead, he says,
something she can cook, sell or use for
medicine. “Then she will protect it be-
cause it improves her life.”
Some of Senegal’s GGW agency proj-
ects do just that on a grand scale, like
investing in gum arabic plantations for
export. Since Senegal’s first sapling in
the Great Green Wall took root in 2008,
the national agency says it has planted
18 million trees on 99,000 acres of re-
stored land. Nine market gardens are up
and running, and three times as many
forage banks are keeping cattle fed in
the lean season. Gazelles, jackals, desert
tortoises and songbirds—not seen in the
region for years—are returning.
All of that amounts to very little com-
pared with the scale of the overall prob-
lem, says Chris Reij, a senior fellow at
the World Resources Institute who has
been working on desertification in the
Sahel since 1978. Even if 99,000 acres
have been reforested in Senegal, a figure
he thinks is likely inflated, the acreage
of forested land disappearing because
of logging, agri culture and construction
in other parts of the country is many
times higher, he says. “So unless you do
something about that, you are still losing
the battle.” Nor does he think massiveat her two 10-year-old nieces perched
atop several bags of recently cut grass.
“Before the Great Green Wall, the kids
had to go with us when we took the
cattle to graze. Now they can stay in
school.” In Mbar Toubab, the fees col-
lected from last year’s forage bank paid
for solar panels to power classrooms.
This year they will cover construction of
a dormitory for students who live too far
to walk every day. The circular invest-
ment is part of the plan, says Goudiaby.
“If we can make the children aware of
the consequences of our actions today,
they will teach the next generation.”The SeedlingS in Senegal’s reforesting
projects are usually locally sourced and
selected for their drought resistance and
hardiness. Thorny desert acacias carry
their own protection from grazing ani-
mals, and in the dry season they shed
their leaves to conserve moisture. Once
baobabs take root, they are long-lived
even under drought conditions. Their
bark can be used to make rope, their
leaves are edible, and their foot-long
fruit can either be juiced or ground up
and roasted to make a coffee-like drink.
Fruit trees are often overlooked in re-
forestation schemes that prioritize har-
diness, and that needs to change, says
Ali Haider, the incoming director of
Senegal’s Great Green Wall agency. “If
you give someone a tree that she doesn’t
need, she won’t take care of it.” Give herFrom left: weeding seedlings in
Koyli Alpha; project manager
El Hadj Goudiaby tends to a
lemon tree in Mbar ToubabGreta
Thunberg
YOUTH ACTIVISM
In 2018, then 15-year-old
Greta Thunberg started a
school strike in Sweden
to draw attention to the
climate crisis, and since then
her message has spread—
despite her avoidance of air
travel because of its high
carbon emissions. Young
people across the world
have followed her path,
striking and marching to
make clear to adults and
decision makers that this
is a true emergency. “We
are children saying, ‘Why
should we care about our
future when no one else is
doing that? And why should
we bother to learn facts
when facts don’t matter in
this society?’ When children
say something like that, I
think adults feel very bad,”
Thunberg told TIME in April.
In late August, she landed in
the U.S. after a 15-day boat
trip across the Atlantic, and
she has plans for a months-
long tour of the Americas—
with a zero-carbon footprint.
“This is an existential crisis
that is going to affect our
whole civilization, the
biggest crisis humanity has
ever faced,” she says. “I’m
not planning to stop this
movement, and I don’t think
anyone else is either.”
ÑSuyin Haynes