the tree into shape and protect it for half
a year from grazing animals. Thanks to his
care and its deep roots, the tree grew back.
CAN YOU REAWAKEN A FOREST?
A World Vision International study of FMNR
has called this method “the largest positive
environmental transformation in Africa in the
past 100 years.” While some governments
might spend millions every year to plant
trees (and see much of the money vanish
into politicians’ pockets), FMNR requires
nothing more than time, effort, and a knife.
Initially it was difficult to get governmental
approval for the FMNR endeavor in Niger.
Regulations prohibited some aspects of it,
and the farmers themselves were unsure
of its wisdom and practicality. Rinaudo
says FMNR really took off there when the
farmers “stopped seeing trees as weeds
and started seeing them as assets.” One
study showed that the adoption of FMNR
could restore arability to infertile land in a
single season as the debris from the trees
was incorporated into the soil by termites
that at the same time loosened it up. Over
five years, fields planted with trees saw a
threefold increase in grain production. The
African regions that have adopted FMNR
now produce surpluses of grain that they
sell for profit. And reforestation has also
mitigated chronic drought in the region—
all because someone figured out how to
get to the root of the problem.ideasanddiscoveries.com 7 May 2020