In the perspective of tacking charge of the existing vulnerability of the area ecosystem despite the efforts made over decades by the actors to stop the phenomenon, the following operational objectives have been identified:

• The consolidation of the socio economic aspect of the sub regional programs of action and the promotion of successful experiences in the region through intra regional exchanges;
• The implementation of an investment regional program able to create an important ecological and socio economic effect, the Great Green Wall Program

Great Green Wall Program

The Great Green Wall Program is an initiative of His Excellency OLUSEGUN OBASANJO, President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, whose implementation principle was adopted by the 7^th ordinary session of the Conference of Leaders and Heads of State, held in Ouagadougou on 1^st-2^nd June 2005. It aims at promoting a socio economic development of the target zones which are exposed to desertification by implementing projects on natural resources conservation and restoration as well as the promotion of economic activities (agriculture, livestock breeding, fishing and handicraft).

Based on the instructions of the Community’s Authorities, the General Secretariat has embarked on a series of activities as part of the drawing up and implementation of the program, in collaboration with member States and their partners. The following activities have been implemented:

The formulation of the program

The conceptual document of the green wall which was drawn in collaboration with OSS suggests a new technical and institutional content to the green wall concept. The main feature of this initiative is to promote the integrated development of zones exposed to desertification and the fight against poverty. The program can be design at 2 levels:

• A national component directed to the implementation of field project especially as part of the consolidation and the sustainability of past or current achievements but also the ‘’creation of new walls’’,
• A regional component to focus on the creation of a regional network of cooperation and exchange of experiences on the green belt notably intervention approaches, the promotion of the results of past or current results, the technical capacity building and the mobilization of the necessary financial resources.

The action plan document (2007-2010) about to be completed suggests investigation stages to be implemented around the following items so as to identify the operational actions of the program:

• the definition of eligibility criteria of the great wall initiative/labeled micro projects;
• the capitalization of knowledge in terms of desertification control;

The organization of technical consultations about the program

Side-event CoP8

 Alongside the 8^th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) held in Madrid (Spain) on 6^th September 2007, CEN-SAD General Secretariat organized a side-event on the Great Green Wall Program aimed at sharing with the other potential actors (UNCCD focal points of the CEN-SAD member States, bilateral and multilateral partners and other regional economic Communities within the Saharan space circum), the projections registered as part of the implementation of the program and to collect technical views to consolidate the conceptual aspects as well as the identified operational mechanisms. The following recommendations were identified:

• consolidate the program’s coordination with the African Union and Senegal so as to have harmonized documents and tools and avoid having several documents on the same initiative;
• identify new financing mechanisms that will favor internal financial participation of the actors in order to ensure durability on one hand and additional external financing on the other;
• develop an effective communication approach so as to get the actors informed about all the intervention levels of the concept, the operational axes and the mechanisms to implement identified actions.

Community-based program for the fight against desertification CEN-SAD – AMU – ECOWAS – OSS

The sub regional consultation organized by CEN-SAD, the Arab Maghreb Union (AMU), the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and the Sahara and Sahel Observatory (OSS) enabled the organization of a regional workshop on resources mobilization and the strengthening of the partnership for desertification control in Gabes (Tunisia) on 17- 19 June 2007. Initiatives to fight against desertification were presented at this meeting among which the great green wall program. In anticipation of the strengthening and consolidation of the efforts made to control this phenomenon, the following were agreed by the actors:

• The pooling of efforts and the sharing of the various experiences in the concerned field;
• The launching of common programs for desertification control of regional scope that lead to concrete effect on the field.

Meeting with Regional Economic Communities

The General Secretariat of the Community of Sahel Saharan States (CEN-SAD) organized in Tripoli from 22-23 October 2007 a consultative workshop with Regional Economic Communities (RECs) and Scientific and Economic Development Bodies on the strengthening of the synergy and the intervention complementarity in terms of rural development and natural resources management. Participants made the recommendations below in order to strengthen the implementation of the great green wall program:

• set up the institutional mechanism that will lead, monitor and evaluate the Great Green Wall program,
• review the past experiences (donors’ round table as part of CCD, donors round table for rural development etc.) and promote the results within the framework of the financing platform of CEN-SAD strategy and especially the great green wall program’s actions,
• create appropriate environment for the cooperation among the concerned RECs (signing of memorandum of understanding) so as to facilitate their commitment and the operational collaboration as part of the program.

CEN-SAD- African Union meeting

A technical meeting to harmonize the orientations and put the great green wall program within an institutional environment was finally organized in Tripoli on 16-17 January 2008 between CEN-SAD and the African Union and helped to pool together their ideas on the program and mainly to agree on the following:

• extend the geographical area of the program to the sub Saharan and northern States,
• set up structures to manage the current program and organize the first session of the management committee alongside the 4^th meeting of CEN-SAD agriculture ministers scheduled to be held soon in Tripoli,
• create a special fund to finance the program’s activities,
• promote the technical content of CEN-SAD document as part of the definition of the intervention logic and the program’s implementation principles.

Meeting with the European Union

The Sahara Great Green Wall initiative was added to the first action plan for the implementation of the EU-AFRICA strategic partnership. The European Union recommended, at this meeting, that this move supports the objectives of the Rio three conventions: desertification, climate change and biodiversity. The EU, stressing on the difficulty of the main issue on the sustainable management of lands which can not be limited to the plantation of trees in the sahel zone as indicated by the action’s heading, suggested that the initiative be focused on the promotion of an approach which is part of the region’s socio environmental problems. The idea is not to create a barrier of trees from west to east but rather to promote an approach which includes all aspects on livelihood and therefore for poverty reduction in Sahel/African. The main aspects of the initiative will then be the issue of water, soil, forest, pastures, rural development. African countries must strongly stick to these aspects with clear links with current and appropriate international initiatives as well as with national development strategies.

A consultative workshop was organized by the European Union on 29 January 2008 in Brussels with in addition to member States of the EU, AU, CEN-SAD, OSS and the Global Mechanism as well as other financing partners.

Senegal initiatives

At the instigation of President Abdoulaye Wade, Senegal also organized a ministerial meeting in Dakar on 29-30 March 2006 as part of the move to define the best ways of implementing the great green wall program. This meeting adopted a conceptual document which suggests the following institutional management: a continental management of the program by a continental pan African agency of the great green wall which will have two regional co ordinations (East and West Africa) implementing the program’s activities in collaboration with local co ordinations of countries crossed by the wall.

The meeting recommended the following:

• the setting up of structures to manage and co ordinate the program at regional and national;
• the setting up of a financial resources mobilization mechanism and a participative approach to carry out the activities on the field;
• the strengthening of the communication strategy in order to regularly inform CEN-SAD member States as well as their partners about the program’s implementation process;
• the drawing of the great green wall program budget for the Community’s Authorities;