Africa, Aid, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Combating Desertification and Drought, Development & Aid, Environment, Featured, Food & Agriculture, Green Economy, Headlines, Poverty & SDGs, Projects, TerraViva United Nations, Water & Sanitation Combating Desertification and Drought Great Green Wall Brings Hope, Greener Pastures to Africa’s Sahel He helps manage a program developed under the Great Green Wall initiative with countries in the Sahel and West Africa. The Great Green Wall, or Great Green Wall of the Sahara and the Sahel (French: Grande Muraille Verte pour le Sahara et le Sahel), is Africa's flagship initiative to combat the effects of desertification.Led by the African Union, the initiative aims to transform the lives of millions of people by creating a mosaic of green and productive landscapes across North Africa. For the latest in-depth look at the Great Green Wall, read Landscape News’s three-part series on the project, Here stands the Great Green Wall. Its core area consists of 780 million hectares and is home to 232 million people. Plot no. The Great Green Wall Programme is a Pan-African Initiative conceived to address land degradation and desertification, boost food security. In recent years, northern Africa has seen the quality of arable land decline significantly due to climate change and poor land management. 1730, Ahmadu Bello Way, Mabushi, Abuja. Launched in 2008 under the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), the Great Green Wall for the Sahara and Sahel Initiative (GGWSSI) is a major African-led initiative which aims at restoring the productivity and vitality of the Sahel region, whilst ‘growing solutions’. The Great Green Wall is taking root in Africa's Sahel region, at the southern edge of the Sahara desert - one of the poorest places on the planet. The Great Green Wall Programme is a Pan-African Initiative conceived to address land degradation and desertification, boost food security. More than anywhere else on Earth, the Sahel is on the frontline of climate change and millions of locals are already facing its devastating impact. Much has changed since 2007, when the African Union launched the Great Green Wall for the Sahara and the Sahel Initiative (GGWSSI) as a bulwark against the encroaching desert. Green tide – The Great Green Wall was conceived as a 7,700-kilometer tree belt stretching the length of the Sahara Desert.