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Namibia keen on green wall concept

ENVIRONMENTAL commissioner Teofilus Nghitila says Namibia supports the introduction of an initiative similar to the great green wall of the Sahel and Sahara initiative in southern Africa.

Nghitila said this initiative has yield commendable results in the Sahel region and “the achievements of this initiative are very impressive.”

He said under this initiative, 27 000 hectares of indigenous trees have been planted on desert and degraded land and it has also put in place centres and institutions of action.

“We will be happy to apply this initiative in southern Africa,” he said last Monday when he opened a three-day workshop on the feasibility of introducing the great wall in southern Africa.

The GGWSSI, an Africa Union (AU) initiative launched in 2007, is aimed at reversing land degradation and desertification in the Sahel and Sahara regions of Africa. So far, the initiative has been implemented in 15 countries of Sahel and the Horn of Africa regions.

Dampha Almami from the AU headquarters in Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) said the AU is very happy with Namibia as the county has done a good job towards bringing the initiative to southern Africa and that is why the workshop was being held in Namibia.

It is believed the initiative will boost food security and support local communities and ecosystems to adapt to climate change.

SADC countries represented at the workshop were Namibia, Angola, Botswana, DRC, Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

Marthin Kasaona, the chief conservation scientist in the Ministry of Environment and Tourism, said Namibia is leading efforts to bring the initiative to southern Africa because in January this year, environment minister Pohamba Shifeta informed the AU commissioner for rural economy and agriculture, Tumusiime Peace, that Namibia is interested in playing a leading role in bringing this initiative to southern Africa.

“Other SADC countries supported this,” said Kasaona.

He said the green wall initiative can restore degraded land to its original form and make it productive again by planting trees and grass on such land.

“If introduced to Namibia, the initiative will help rural communities to restore degraded land. It starts on a small scale but it will expand,” said Kasaona.

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