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Groundwater rises across the African Sahel after decades of drought

Groundwater rises across the African Sahel after decades of drought

Built World

Wells refill and water tables climb in a region long defined by famine

August 4th, 2021: Report: water is rising across the Sahel

Overview

Updated Aug 5

For decades the Sahel meant one thing: drought and famine. Now wells that once ran dry are filling, and in places the water table has climbed more than 13 feet.

The recovery is spreading across the southern edge of the Sahara, from Niger to Lake Chad. Farmers are irrigating fields that sat parched for a generation, and a lake that nearly vanished is refilling.

Why it matters

Millions of Sahel farmers who lived through decades of drought now have wells that fill and fields they can water again.

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Key Indicators

13+ ft
Water table rise
How far the underground water level has climbed in some Sahel locations.
200M
Trees regrown in southern Niger
Trees nurtured back from suppressed roots on formerly bare farmland.
23%
Rainfall deficit, 1970-1998
Southwest Niger's water table rose even as monsoon rain fell well below normal.
600+
Scimitar-horned oryx
A species once extinct in the wild, now reintroduced and breeding in Chad.
11
Great Green Wall countries
Nations in the African Union tree-planting effort launched in 2007.

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People Involved

Chris Reij
Chris Reij
Dryland restoration specialist, World Resources Institute
Documenting the spread of farmer-led tree regrowth
GF
Guillaume Favreau
Hydrologist, French Institute of Research for Development (IRD)
Studied the rising water table in southwest Niger

Organizations Involved

WR
World Resources Institute
Research and advocacy nonprofit
Tracking Sahel land restoration

A global environmental research group studying how Sahel farmers restore degraded land.
Great Green Wall Initiative
Great Green Wall Initiative
African Union program
Reframed from a tree belt to broad land restoration

An African Union effort launched in 2007 to restore land across 11 Sahel countries.

Timeline

January 1950 August 2021

6 events Latest: August 4th, 2021 · 5 years ago
Tap a bar to jump to that date

  1. Report: water is rising across the Sahel

    Latest Feature

    A feature documents refilling wells, water tables up 13 feet or more, a recovering Lake Chad, and 200 million regrown trees in southern Niger.

  2. Water storage keeps rising

    Research

    A study of the Niger basin from 2003 to 2013 finds stored water climbing faster than rainfall alone can explain.

  3. The Niamey paradox explained

    Research

    Hydrologists link the rising water table near Niamey to land clearing, not extra rain.

  4. Great Green Wall launched

    Policy

    The African Union starts a plan for a coast-to-coast tree belt across 11 Sahel countries.

  5. The great Sahel droughts begin

    Crisis

    Years of failed rains bring famine across the Sahel. Lake Chad shrinks toward a fraction of its former size.

  6. Millet farming expands sixfold

    Background

    Farmers clear Sahel savannah for millet, hardening the soil and boosting rainwater runoff.

Scenarios

1

Lake Chad keeps refilling as strong monsoons hold

Possible Resolves by End of 2028

Discussed by: Yale Environment 360, Lake Chad Basin Commission

Stronger monsoon rains and recharged aquifers keep feeding Lake Chad. Satellite imagery shows its surface area holding above its late-1990s low or growing further. Communities that abandoned fishing and farming return to the shoreline.

2

Rising wells reverse as pumping and population grow

Uncertain Resolves by End of 2030

Discussed by: Hydrogeology Journal, ScienceDirect groundwater researchers

More people, more irrigation, and heavier borehole pumping outpace natural recharge. A peer-reviewed study reports Sahel water tables falling again in areas that recently rose, showing the gains were not permanent.

3

Great Green Wall misses its 2030 restoration target

Likely Resolves by End of 2030

Discussed by: UN Convention to Combat Desertification, Smithsonian Magazine

The initiative set a goal of restoring 100 million hectares by 2030. Slow funding, seedling die-offs, and insecurity across the Sahel keep results far short. Official reviews confirm the target is not met.

4

Scimitar-horned oryx upgraded off Extinct in the Wild

Possible Resolves by End of 2028

Discussed by: International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), Sahara Conservation

The Chad reintroduction herd keeps breeding past 600 animals. The International Union for Conservation of Nature, which ranks species' extinction risk, moves the oryx off its Extinct in the Wild listing to a less severe category.

Historical Context

3 moments from history that rhyme with this story — and how they unfolded.

1931-1939

American Dust Bowl recovery (1930s)

Drought and over-plowing turned the U.S. southern plains into dust storms that buried farms and drove families off the land. Millions of acres lost their topsoil. The federal government responded with soil conservation and tree-planting programs.

Then

New farming rules and windbreak tree belts slowed the erosion within a few years.

Now

The plains largely recovered, showing that land management, not just weather, decided the outcome.

Why this matters now

Like the Sahel, the Dust Bowl showed that how people treat the soil can turn a disaster zone back into farmland.

1960-2005

Aral Sea desiccation (1960s-2000s)

Soviet irrigation projects diverted the rivers feeding the Aral Sea in Central Asia. The lake, once one of the world's largest, shrank to a fraction of its size, leaving dry seabed and ruined fishing towns.

Then

Fisheries collapsed and toxic dust storms swept the exposed lakebed.

Now

Most of the sea never returned, a warning about how water diversion can be near-permanent.

Why this matters now

The Aral Sea is the cautionary opposite of Lake Chad: human water use can destroy a lake as surely as it can help one refill.

1994-2005

China's Loess Plateau restoration (1990s-2000s)

One of the most eroded regions on Earth, the Loess Plateau, was restored through terracing, tree planting, and grazing limits. The World Bank backed the work across tens of thousands of square miles.

Then

Vegetation returned, erosion dropped, and local farm incomes rose within a decade.

Now

The project became a global model for reversing severe land degradation at scale.

Why this matters now

It shows what deliberate large-scale restoration can achieve, a contrast to the Sahel's more farmer-driven, bottom-up recovery.

Sources

(5)
Yale Environment 360 HumanProgress Water Resources Research Hydrogeology Journal Smithsonian Magazine