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'Forgotten' water harvesting system transforms 'barren wasteland' into thriving farmland (www.upworthy.com)

submitted 20 hours ago by SteveKLord@slrpnk.net to c/farming@slrpnk.net

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Just a few years ago, the Sahel region at the northern edge of Senegal was a "barren wasteland" where nothing had grown for 40 years. But the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and local villagers teamed up to regreen the area, bringing back agriculture, improving the economy of the people who live there, and preventing the climate migration that desertification ultimately leads to.

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[–] dgkf@lemmy.ml 36 points 18 hours ago (19 children)

I’ve seen a few posts on this and it’s always exciting to see this mix of cultural wisdom and environmentalism.

But I’m always left wondering why we aren’t supporting these communities with some heavy equipment to do this. From the article it takes a person an entire day to dig one of these moons. Surely some construction equipment could work order(s?) of magnitude faster. I can’t help the hinting feeling that we’re offloading all of the burdens of addressing global climate change onto the communities that are already paying the steepest price.

Is it the climate? How remote the locations are? Challenges with sourcing parts? Hope someone can clarify why heavy equipment would be prohibitive.

[–] HobbitFoot@thelemmy.club 32 points 18 hours ago (3 children)

Surely some construction equipment could work order(s?) of magnitude faster.

You have to supply the support network for the equipment. For a lot of less developed areas, it isn't worth it to supply a tractor which will become a statue.

[–] Steve@startrek.website 13 points 14 hours ago

And part of the project is to employ local labor

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