REGENERATION OF THE LOWLANDS OF NDINDERLENG: A LOCAL CONVENTION FOR INTEGRATED RESOURCE MANAGEMENT (COGIRBAF) IN THE COMMUNITY OF KEUR SAMBA GUEYE

Abstract

The video recounts the experience promoted by the municipality of Keur Samba Gueye, in the region of Fatick, concerning the upgrading of the Ndinderleng lowlands. The municipality was affected by poverty and specifically food insecurity.

The innovation consisted in the regeneration and the upgrading of the lowland in order to transform it into 500 hectares of soil available for rice cultivation as well as market gardening and for the creation of a community natural reserve for ecosystem regeneration.

Within this framework a local convention bringing together local communities as well as the different users of the lowlands (transhumant pastoralists, residents, beekeepers, fishers, craftsmen, hunters, traditional healers) was set up under the name “Convention Locale pour la Gestion Intégrée des Ressources du bas-fond–COGIRBAF” (Local Convention for integrated management of Ndinderling lowland’s resources). At the moment 212 hectares of the lowlands are farmed by rice producers and market gardeners coming from 22 local villages that surround the lowlands.

The experience of COGIRBAF is focused on an innovation that is at once institutional, economical, organisational and ecological. It was made possible thanks to the technical and financial support of the State and international partners, but its success was guaranteed above all by the establishment of a local multi-actors and multi-territory convention and the scope of the organizational mechanism: village committees structured around a management committee, much desired by the municipality.

Beyond the regeneration of this former bush, the foundations of a local economic development co-managed by various categories of actors (local elected representatives, local private sector, inhabitants, etc.) and by various territories have been established and they confirm the economic, socio-cultural, socio-political, ecological and ultimately territorial dimensions of sustainable development. We see here a multidimensional innovation that brings an added value from an environmental, economic and social point of view to all the communities that revolve around the lowland.