On Monday, the President of the Republic of Niger, Mohamed Bazoum, presented the Great Green Wall project as a potential growth sector for the African private sector.
The Head of State was speaking at the opening ceremony of the “forum on the commitment of the private sector to the Great Green Wall initiative” in Niamey, organized jointly by the Issoufou Mahamadou Foundation (FIM) of former Nigerien President Issoufou Mahamadou, the Nigerien ministry responsible for the environment, Future Agribusiness (FAGRIB), the Great Green Wall Foundation (GGWoA) and the Pan-African Agency for the Great Green Wall (APGMV).
Mr. Bazoum took the opportunity to invite economic operators to invest in this initiative to benefit from it, pointing out that it is a transformative program that aims to tackle the challenges of desertification, food insecurity, climate change, poverty, and the loss of biodiversity, as well as security and migration challenges in the countries concerned.
Similarly, the President of the Republic, Mohamed Bazoum, declared that “this innovative initiative, which integrates the urgent issues of climate, security, and development, is one of the most appropriate solutions to the priorities of the fragile areas of the Sahel”.
Furthermore, the Nigerien leader maintained that landscape restoration can offer the private sector, given a favorable institutional and legal environment, real investment opportunities in small and medium-sized agricultural enterprises, in food and non-timber forest product value chains, in high-value-added crops, and new markets such as carbon markets.
The Great Green Wall for the Sahara and Sahel, commonly known as the Great Green Wall (GGW), is the African Union’s flagship initiative to combat the effects of climate change and desertification in Africa.