Economics of Great Green Wall: Opportunities for improved targeting and efficiency

Abstract The Sahel region is confronted with a severe problem of land degradation, which is jeopardizing livelihoods and stymieing efforts to eradicate food insecurity. The Great Green Wall programme is a colossal initiative designed to improve communities’ resilience and restore degraded ecosystems by planting locally suitable native trees and grasses. We evaluated the economic costs and benefits of land restoration under this programme. The results show that the average annual costs of land degradation due to land use and land cover changes in the entire Sahel region during 2001–2018 period were equal to 3 billion USD. Every USD invested into land restoration is found to yield from 1.7 USD to 2.9 USD. About 10 years are needed for all land restoration activities to reach positive benefit-cost ratios from the social perspective. The amount of investments needed for land restoration across the Sahel is estimated to be between 18–70 bln USD.