DGG publishes book that provides new perspectives on natural resource management in the Sahel

The book “New Perspectives on Natural Resource Management in the Sahel” is the result of a project, funded by Danida, aiming at providing an overview of recent developments in the understanding of the environmental resources and their management in the Sahel-region at the southern edge of Sahara.

The sahel region, one of the world’s poorest, is often described as exposed to recurrent droughts and haunted by desertification, assumed to be a result of human overuse of vegetation, soil and water resources. This book re-examines these widely held views, in order to provide a more nuanced and up-to-date status of agricultural production systems, the natural resources they depend upon, and the social institutions involved in local and national scale management of the resources.

The book argues that the problems in the region should be considered general development problems, rather than specific environmental problems, a conclusion with important implications for national and donor policies.

Copies of the book can be requested from Kjeld Rasmussen (kr@geo.ku.dk).

"New Perspectives on Natural Resource Management in the Sahel." Simon Bolwig, Kjeld Rasmussen, Ced Hesse, Thea Hilhorst & Malene Kauffmann Hansen. Sahel-Sudan Environmental Research Initiative (SEREIN) Occasional Paper no.17, Department of Geography and Geology, University of Copenhagen, 2011.
ISBN 978-87-87945-99-8