Great Green Wall Research Articles

The Impact of Drought on Terrestrial Carbon in the West African Sahel: Implications for Natural Climate Solutions

AbstractTerrestrial ecosystems store more than twice the carbon of the atmosphere, and are critical to climate change mitigation efforts. This has led to a proliferation of land‐based carbon sequestration efforts, such as re/afforestation associated with the Great Green Wall in the West African Sahel (WAS GGW). However, we currently lack comprehensive assessments of the long‐term viability of these ecosystems' carbon storage in the context of increasingly severe climate extremes. The WAS is particularly prone to recurrent and disruptive extremes, exemplified by the persistent and severe late‐20th century drought. We assessed the response and recovery of WAS GGW carbon stocks and fluxes to this late‐20th century drought, and the subsequent rainfall recovery, by leveraging a suite of terrestrial ecosystem models. While multi‐model mean carbon fluxes (e.g., gross primary production, respiration) partly recovered to pre‐drought levels, modeled total (above and below ground) ecosystem carbon stock falls to as much as two standard deviations below pre‐drought levels and does not recover even ∼20 years after the maximum drought anomaly. Furthermore, to the extent that the modeled regional carbon stock recovers, it is nearly entirely driven by atmospheric CO2 trends rather than the precipitation recovery. Uncertainties in regional ecosystem carbon simulation are high, as the models' carbon responses to drought displayed a nearly 10‐standard deviation spread. Nevertheless, the multi‐model average response highlights the strong and persistent impact of drought on terrestrial carbon storage, and the potential risks of relying on terrestrial ecosystems as a “natural climate solution” for climate change mitigation.

Quantifying Sahel Runoff Sensitivity to Climate Variability, Soil Moisture and Vegetation Changes Using Analytical Methods

AbstractWhilst substantial efforts have been deployed to understand the “Sahel hydrological paradox”, most of the studies focused on small experimental watersheds around the central and western Sahel. To our knowledge, there is no study on this issue covering all the watersheds located within the Sahelian belt. The absence of relevant studies may be attributed to a sparsity of in situ data leading to a dearth of knowledge on the Sahel hydrology. To fill this knowledge gap, the present study leverages analytical methods and freely available geospatial datasets to understand the effects of climatic factors, soil moisture and vegetation cover changes on surface runoff in 45 watersheds located within the Sahelian belt over two decades (2000–2021). Analyses show increasing trends in annual precipitation and potential evapotranspiration (PET) in more than 80% of the watersheds. Surface runoff, soil moisture (SM), and vegetation cover measured using the normalised difference vegetation index (NDVI) also show increasing trends in all the watersheds. Multivariable linear regression (MLR) analyses reveal that precipitation, PET, SM, and NDVI contribute about 62% of surface runoff variance. Further analyses using MLR, and the partial least squares regression (PLSR) show that precipitation and NDVI are the main factors influencing surface runoff in the Sahel. Elasticity coefficients reveal that a 10% increase in precipitation, SM and NDVI may lead to about 22%, 26% and 45% increase in surface runoff respectively. In contrast, a 10% increase in PET may lead to a 61% decline in surface runoff in the Sahel. This is the first hydrological study covering all the watersheds located within the Sahelian belt with results showing that surface runoff is influenced by climate, SM and NDVI to varying degrees. Given the unique hydrological characteristics of the Sahel, a better understanding of the different factors influencing surface runoff may be crucial for enhancing climate adaptation and ecological restoration efforts in the region such as the Great Green Wall Initiative.

Climate-Induced Migration: Conflict Resolution and Legal Efforts in Pacific, Africa, and South Asia

Climate-induced migration involves people relocating caused by detrimental climate changes affecting their living environment. Pacific, Africa, and South Asia have experienced climate-induced migration resulting from extreme weather events, sea level rise, drought and desertification, and temperature extremes. The purpose of this research is to find out in terms of conflict resolution, what legal efforts have been made by the government of the affected regions to address climate-induced migration. This study uses descriptive qualitative method and case studies. Based on the results obtained from the data, it was found that the affected governments are pursuing various legal efforts to be able to tackle climate-induced migration. Several efforts made, namely “Migration with Dignity” policy, the Pacific Adaptation to Climate Change (PACC) Project, Great Green Wall initiative, the African Union’s Regional Economic Communities (RECs), Bangladesh’s Climate Change Strategy and Action Plan (BCCSAP), the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) Disaster Management Centre, and India’s National Action Plan on Climate Change (NAPCC). The regional initiatives mentioned earlier play pivotal roles in implementing these frameworks and fostering collaborative endeavors, whilst the innovative legal frameworks, guided by SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound) indicators, ensure that climate-induced migration is addressed effectively. To sum up, dealing with climate-induced migration requires a holistic approach involving regional collaboration and innovative legal frameworks.

GGW-BDF: an online tool for using earth observation and Chinese ecosystem restoration experiences in support of the Great Green Wall initiative

ABSTRACT The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) establish a fresh global framework for evaluating the development agenda, emphasizing prosperity, growth, inclusivity, and transparency while safeguarding our planet Earth. Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) represents a clear target for assessing the achievement of SDG 15.3. In response to the shortcomings of the African Great Green Wall initiative with respect to LDN monitoring, reporting, and intervention, we developed an online tool, the Great Green Wall Big Data Facilitator (GGW-BDF), based on earth observation data (e.g. SDGSAT-1), cutting-edge big data analysis technologies, and Chinese experience in combating desertification, to support the implementation of the African Great Green Wall initiative. The GGW-BDF comprises an LDN data portal, desertification control knowledge, and e-learning resources. This study highlights the functionality of this tool to support stakeholders across countries in monitoring LDN while providing the successful technoloiges to restore degraded or barren land. The contributions of the GGW-BDF are very useful in supporting the Pan-African Agency of the Great Green Wall (PAGGW), and will hopefully be continuously upgraded for being a part of the federated toolbox of the Group on Earth Observation (GEO) LDN Flagship.

Bridges Between Soil Restoration, Land Management and Community Involvement in the Great Green Wall of Mauritania: A Preliminary Study

In the Sahel, land ownership is significantly influenced by the complexity of hierarchical, ethnic, and tribal aspects as well as communal, religious, and state rights. This complicates the development of large-scale ecological projects. This study investigates the positive and negative experiences that have changed the method and attitude of agencies in Mauritania to providing a holistic and ecosystemic approach to conservation and restoration. The physical environment and society’s perception of applied restoration measures are of great importance for reducing environmental degradation and promoting future actions. Interviews with stakeholders helped understand the social reality and impact of restoration and management measures taken on the communities. The results of this study revealed that measures such as fencing plots, preventing the passage of livestock, and stabilizing sand dunes noticeably improved the vegetative cover of the soil in the Sahel. This improvement in vegetation cover has had direct effects on the improvement of soil quality indicators such as organic carbon content, pH, soil structure, color, and texture. Different stakeholders have shown considerable involvement in projects, positively valuing their implementation and observing improvements in their daily lives.

Quantifying the impact of Great Green Wall and Corporate plantations on tree density and biomass in Sahelian Senegal

The Great Green Wall (GGW) is an international initiative to combat land degradation and restore native plant life in the Sahel, but due to a lack of monitoring tools, it remains unknown to be considered as success or failure. Here, we quantify the impact of GGW plantations and Corporate plantations (privately owned) in Sahelian Senegal based on remote sensing data and deep learning by mapping individual trees and their biomass across the Sahel region. Tree features (cover, density and above-ground biomass) have been computed in every hectare of 42 plantations (of both, corporate and GGW) and their surrounding non-planted areas, subsequently used for a comparative analysis of tree features. Results showed that gains in tree features varied substantially between plantations. At plot scale, among Corporate plantations, the average gain in tree density was 61.16±42.12 trees/ha while it was 5.7 ± 5.8 trees/ha for GGW plantations. In regards to tree cover, the average gain was 618.5 ± 588.5 m2/ha for Corporate plantations and 71.72±108.89 m2/ha for GGW plantations. For the above-ground biomass, the average gain was 3.36±3.29 tons/ha in the Corporate plantations and 0.46±0.67 tons/ha in the GGW plantations. The average gain in foliar biomass in the Corporate plantations was 0.15±0.13 tons/ha and in the GGW plantations, it was 0.02±0.03 tons/ha. The average gain in wood biomass was 3.21±3.12 tons/ha among the Corporate plantations and was 0.43±0.64 tons/ha among the GGW plantations. Notably, regarding the relative benefit in terms of ecosystem services per unit of density, each tree in GGW plantations contribute more to ecosystem services per unit of density compared to Corporate plantations. In GGW, each gained tree contributes 18 m2 of cover, 116.1 kg of above-ground biomass, 5.6 kg of foliar biomass, and 114.2 kg of woody biomass, while in corporate plantations, on the other hand, each gained tree adds 9 m2 of cover, 48.4 kg of above-ground biomass, 2.3 kg of foliar biomass, and 46.3 kg of woody biomass. These findings are opposed to conventional paradigms, suggesting that the Great Green Wall, while perhaps missing its tree density targets, has succeeded in its mission to produce ecosystem services per tree. This raises important questions about the redefinition of objectives in reforestation projects, focusing on quality rather than quantity, a perspective that could transform our understanding of the successes and failures of these essential ecological restoration initiatives. However, the assessment primarily relies on indicators such as cover and biomass, potentially overlooking other crucial ecosystem services. Therefore, while our conclusions underscore the effectiveness of reforestation initiatives, future research should aim to establish a more comprehensive understanding of ecosystem services by incorporating additional indicators beyond cover and biomass, such as species diversity, soil health, water retention, and habitat quality.

Contrasting consequences of the Great Green Wall: Easing aridity while increasing heat extremes

Contrasting consequences of the Great Green Wall: Easing aridity while increasing heat extremes

‘Growing a World Wonder’: The Great Green Wall and the History of Environmental Decline in the Sahel, 1450–2022

This article offers a historical critique of the Great Green Wall Initiative of the Sahel and the Sahara (GGW) – an audacious project to stop the southern encroachment of the Sahara Desert by constructing a wall of trees across the continent. By situating the GGW within the longue durée of the Sahel’s environmental history, it examines how the narratives of environmental decline that underpin the initiative are not only misguided but born out of the transatlantic slave trade, imperialism and colonialism, and the neoliberal development projects of the postcolonial period. In doing so, it argues that narratives of environmental decline have not only served as a dynamic framework to rationalise Western exploitation of the Sahel’s environments over time, but have obscured, or even silenced, the effective practices of dryland regeneration of Sahelian communities.

Bird diversity in a Sahelian ecosystem under restoration: A study in the great Grenn wall extension area of Senegal

In this study, we survey the avian biodiversity in Koyli Alpha, Senegal, located in the extension area of the Great Green Wall (GGW) project in Senegal to restore the degraded ecosystems by the long years of drought during the 1970s in addition to anthropogenic pressures. Data are collected during a period of 52 days between July 2019 and Jun 2021 in Koyli Alpha and their surroundings, we identified the presence of avian species through daytime focal observations using transects, fixed points and trapping cameras. Thus, we recorded the presence of 198 total bird species. Species composed of 143 landbirds and 55 waterbirds distributed in 22 orders and 59 families. The most common were granivorous birds such as the Golgen sparrow (Passer luteus) and the Red-billed quelea (Quelea quelea). Among these inventoried species, three are categorized as critically endangered species (CR) (IUCN Redlist). They are the Rüppell's vulture (Gyps rueppelli), the White-backed vulture (Gyps africanus) and the hooded vulture (Necrosyrtes monachus). Additionally, the Martial eagle (Polemaetus bellicosus) is categorized as endangered (EN), and the Great grey shrike (Lanius meridionalis), the Abyssinian ground hornbill (Bucorvus abyssinicus) and the European turtle dove (Streptopelia turtur) are categorized as vulnerable species (VN). Furthermore, 37% of observed birds are palearctic migratory species.

Deployment of performance indicators toward bridging monitoring gaps in Africa’s Great Green Wall

Background: The health and productivity of the land across the Sahel are in declension due to desertification. This has lowered the quality of ecosystem services and has led to a vicious cycle of drought, famine, poverty, and insecurity in the region. As one of the flagship interventions of the UN’s decade (2020-2030) of ecosystem restoration to tackle desertification and respond to climate change, there are mixed reactions to the successes of the Great Green Wall (GGW) in Nigeria due to the failure of the Sustainability of Policy Instrument. Methods: A two-round Delphi reached consensus on 42 sub-indicators under 14 indicators as indicated by Kendell’s (W=0.509, P=0.001) and high correlation between rounds (rho=0.959, P=0.001). The indicators were then deployed to assess the GGW in a questionnaire (n=401) via a multi-stage sampling, and their performance was weighted using principal component analysis (PCA). Results: "Proportion of land reclaimed" was recorded as the highest-performing indicator due to the multifaceted afforestation program covering fodder and wood lot areas, while "dune fixation" has the least performance due to the lack of employment of ecological engineering tools. The findings showed that the presence of local jobs is not significant in raising the livelihood status above the poverty line. Conclusion: To meet the 2030 timeline, there is a need to scale up the implementation of the GGW and support the desert frontline states (DFS) with alternative energy to reduce the rate of deforestation.

The moral landscape of biological conservation: Understanding conceptual and normative foundations

Biological conservation practices and approaches take many forms. Conservation projects do not only differ in their aims and methods, but also concerning their conceptual and normative background assumptions and their underlying motivations and objectives. We draw on philosophical distinctions from the ethics of conservation to explain variances of different positions on conservation projects along six dimensions: (1) conservation ideals, (2) intervention intuitions, (3) the moral considerability of nonhuman beings, (4) environmental values, (5) views on nature and (6) human roles in nature. The result is a map of the moral landscape of biological conservation, on which these six dimensions are layered. This map functions as a heuristic tool to understand conceptual and normative foundations of specific conservation projects, which we will illustrate with four paradigmatic examples: the Pisavaara Strict Nature Reserve, Predator Free New Zealand, the Oostvaardersplassen Nature Reserve and the Great Green Wall Project. With this map as a heuristic tool, we aim to conceptually illuminate disagreement and clarify misunderstandings between representatives of different environmental protection strategies and to show that the same project can be supported (or criticised) on different grounds.

‘Growing a World Wonder’: The Great Green Wall and the History of Environmental Decline in the Sahel, 1450–2022

This article offers a historical critique of the Great Green Wall Initiative of the Sahel and the Sahara (GGW) – an audacious project to stop the southern encroachment of the Sahara Desert by constructing a wall of trees across the continent. By situating the GGW within the longue durée of the Sahel’s environmental history, it examines how the narratives of environmental decline that underpin the initiative are not only misguided but born out of the transatlantic slave trade, imperialism and colonialism, and the neoliberal development projects of the postcolonial period. In doing so, it argues that narratives of environmental decline have not only served as a dynamic framework to rationalise Western exploitation of the Sahel’s environments over time, but have obscured, or even silenced, the effective practices of dryland regeneration of Sahelian communities.

Restoring Food Systems with Nutritious Native Plants: Experiences from the African Drylands.

Twenty-seven African countries have committed to restore more than 100 million hectares of degraded land by 2030 as part of the African Forest Landscape Restoration Initiative (AFR100). In addition, for the same period of time, the African-led Great Green Wall initiative seeks to restore 100 million hectares of degraded agro-sylvo-pastoral lands in the Sahel. The current UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration (2021-2030) moreover marks an unprecedented opportunity to shape future landscapes, and forge more biodiverse and nutritious food systems. Yet most large-scale restoration actions continue to be largely isolated from socioeconomic challenges facing dryland communities, not least food security and acute malnutrition. Such isolations contribute to low restoration successes and outcomes in Africa's drylands. At the same time, international interventions aimed at improving acute malnutrition in the drylands have not adequately considered the agriculture-nutrition linkages, particularly "pre-farm gate"-including consumption pathways which optimize the use of native plant diversity. This article identifies priority action areas emerging from experiences over 5 years of restoration activities carried out in the Sahel through Food and Agriculture Organization's (FAO) Action Against Desertification Programme supporting the implementation of Africa's Great Green Wall. These actions aim to inform development and humanitarian interventions on the ground to render restoration interventions nutrition-sensitive and hence more effective in practice. Recognizing the symbiotic relationship between landscapes and livelihoods, FAO developed a blueprint for large-scale restoration that combines biophysical and socioeconomic aspects for the benefit of rural communities. The approach builds climate and nutritional resilience into its restoration interventions as a preventative approach to reverse land degradation and ultimately improve livelihoods, food security, and nutrition. FAO's experience demonstrated that what is planted and when has the potential to not only significantly improve biodiversity and reverse land degradation, but also positively influence nutrition outcomes. Future interventions in the drylands must involve joint efforts between nutritionists and natural resource managem prove both human and planetary health.

Integration of RS/GIS in Assessing the National Great Green Wall Woodlots/Orchards in Katagum LGA, Bauchi State, Nigeria

The study is based on the premise that climate change and desertification have strong connection in the ecosystem. Because desertification affects climate change through the loss of fertile soil and corresponding vegetation, it also has important repercussions for the global climate system. Through the Great Green Wall (GGW) tree planting project initiatives, a lot has been achieved elsewhere hence this study. In Nigeria, the programme was introduced in Bauchi State (northern Nigeria) as one of the 11 front line states where desertification is observed. The study was conducted under the hypothetical assumption that the planting of Woodlots and Orchards can help checkmate and control the seeming desertification in the Katagum Local Government Area of Bauchi State, Nigeria. Six woodlots and Orchards were identified and mapped using the Google Earth image visualization platform and the spatial extent of change were determined in hectare (Ha) using the digitizing tool in the software. Except Dugunde (which reduced from 2,499.65 to 2,265.96 Ha), the rest increased within the period under review. Dagoro increased from 371.45 Ha to 372.91 Ha, followed by Dangazau (324.02 to 328.05 Ha), Gambaki (1,154.04 to 1.167.07 Ha), Dugunde 2 (469.42 to 537.74 Ha), and Dugunde 3 (719.58 to 749.61). The Orchard and Woodlots’ growth is understandable because of continuous watering and tending of the vegetation over the years. From sampled questionnaires, the study further reveals that the Woodlots and Orchards are very effective mechanism in controlling desertification in the Northern State. The study shows that the locals are satisfied with the project and are ready to support the programme because it provided employment for them, and also helps to preserve the environment and tree species. The satisfaction with the use of woodlots and orchards

Exploring The Symbiotic Economic Benefits Between Farmers and Herders to Promote Peaceful Coexistence in Taraba State Nigeria

This paper explored the symbiotic economic benefits between farmers and herders in Taraba State to promote peaceful coexistence. Taraba State is one of the states in the North East region of Nigeria that is mainly affected by the farmers-herders crisis. The paper illustrated the causes of the farmers-herders crisis which include the growing population, abandonment of the grazing reserve system, and proliferation of small arms and light weapons among others. Although the Federal and State Governments have responded in several ways, among which the creation of grazing reserves in 1965, the establishment of the National Commission for Nomadic Education (NCNE) in 1989, the use of the Armed Forces to curb internal security caused by farmers-herders crisis, proposed National Grazing Reserve Bill 2016, proposed Cattle Ranching System 2018, legislation prohibiting open grazing and the Great Green Wall Agency of the Federal Government. All these efforts by the Federal Government and various State Governments could not bring the desired peaceful coexistence between farmers and herders. The crisis still lingered in Taraba State and many other states. Therefore, the paper explored the symbiotic economic benefits that could be enjoyed by farmers and herders leading to peaceful coexistence. Some of the symbiotic economic benefits capable of stimulating peaceful coexistence are; after harvesting crops on their farm, they usually allow cattle to graze on the leftovers, during which excrement from the cows provide manure for the farm, use of yam and cassava peels for preparation of animal feeds, use of rice, guinea corn, maize, and millet chaff for animal feeds and use of animal waste as fertilizer. The author concluded that exploring the symbiotic economic benefits explicated in this paper can bring about peaceful coexistence between farmers and herders which will also result in a peaceful Taraba State. It was suggested that government and private individuals should establish ranches within farming communities in such a manner that herders can get animal feeds from farmers while the farmers get manure from the herders’ farms.

Aeolian disaster risk evaluation in the African Sahel

The Sahel is facing a serious environmental crisis due to aeolian disaster that has seriously affected the local development and survival of residents. Thus, evaluating the aeolian disaster risk levels and their variation in the Sahel is important. This study established an optimal model by evaluating the applicability of different models in the aeolian disaster risk determination in the Sahel. Using this model, the spatiotemporal changes in the risk subsystem of aeolian disaster (hazard, sensitivity, vulnerability, and restorability) and the aeolian disaster risk in the Sahel from 2000 to 2020 were analyzed. Based on this analysis, the impact of climate change and human activities on the aeolian disaster risk in the Sahel was evaluated. Results revealed that the variable fuzzy recognition (VFR) based on the aeolian disaster risk index (ADRI) model had the highest accuracy, reaching 89.72 %. The middle of the Sahel, located in the desert-grassland transition zone, exhibited a high hazard, sensitivity, and vulnerability, rendering it highly susceptible to aeolian disaster. The proportion of areas with very low and very high aeolian disaster risk levels decreased from 2000 to 2020, while those with low and high levels increased, and the change in moderate risk level areas remained relatively stable. Areas of low, moderate, and high risk are more sensitive to climate change and human activities and are subjected to greater pressure for change. Human activities were the main factor for the change of ADRI in the Sahel, accounting for 69.74 and 58.19 % of the increased and decreased areas of ADRI, respectively. This study evaluated the level of aeolian disaster risk in the Sahel and identified the main driving factors, providing a reference for Sahel countries to better implement the Green Great Wall (GGW) program in Africa, thereby mitigating the adverse effects of aeolian disaster.

Beyond climate change: The effects of deforestation on food security in the Lake Chad region

Deforestation of the Lake Chad region (LCR) has led to the loss of vegetation and biodiversity in the area. This situation has not only exacerbated the adverse effects of rising aridity in the region but has resulted in its desertification. Agricultural activities are endangered as a result of this unhealthy practice. Extant studies have largely focused on the nexus between climate change and food insecurity in the LCR without adequate attention on the impact of deforestation. The study examined how deforestation in concert with climate change has affected food security in the LCR. Data were generated from secondary sources and analysed using qualitative descriptive method. The theory of Anthropogenic Global Warming was adopted. The study found, among others, that the increasing deforestation of the LCR’s vegetation is implicated in food insecurity menacing the area. It recommended, inter alia, an effective implementation of the African Union’s Great Green Wall initiative aimed at ensuring strategic reforestation of the region in order to attenuate the adverse effects of climate change and restore the region’s viability for agricultural production.

Great Green Walls: Hype, Myth, and Science

Visions of planting walls of trees to block the expansion of the desert have long been promoted but never realized. The green wall myth persists today even though it is premised on outdated understandings of desertification. We review the history of the idea of green walls and focus on two sets of contemporary initiatives to assess their outcomes: peri-Saharan programs (Algeria's Green Dam and Great Green Wall in sub-Saharan Africa) and China's Three Norths Shelterbelt Program. This review reveals a mixed record of technical success with low rates of the establishment of monocultures of fast-growing trees vulnerable to disease. While there is evidence for reduced wind erosion in some areas, afforestation is also associated with reduced soil moisture and lowering of water tables. Social impacts include increased water scarcity for people and livestock in some cases, and resource enclosures that particularly work against pastoralist livelihoods.

HiLPD-GEE: high spatial resolution land productivity dynamics calculation tool using Landsat and MODIS data

ABSTRACT Land productivity is one of the sub-indicators for measuring SDG 15.3.1. Land Productivity Dynamics (LPD) is the most popular approach for reporting this indicator at the global scale. A major limitation of existing products of LPD is the coarse spatial resolution caused by remote sensing data input, which cannot meet the requirement of fine-scale land degradation assessment. To resolve this problem, this study developed a tool (HiLPD-GEE) to calculate 30 m LPD by fusing Landsat and MODIS data based on Google Earth Engine (GEE). The tool generates high-quality fused Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) dataset for LPD calculation through gap filling and Savitzky–Golay filtering (GF-SG) and then uses the method recommended by the European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC) to calculate LPD. The tool can calculate 30 m LPD in any spatial range within any time window after 2013, supporting global land degradation monitoring. To demonstrate the applicability of this tool, the LPD product was produced for African Great Green Wall (GGW) countries. The analysis proves that the 30 m LPD product generated by HiLPD-GEE could reflect the land productivity change effectively and reflect more spatial details. The results also provide an important insight for the GGW initiative.

The Great Green Wall in Senegal: questioning the idea of acceleration through the conflicting temporalities of politics and nature among the Sahelian populations

In January 2021, the Great Green Wall Accelerator was announced at the third One Planet Summit in Paris. Based on the notion of acceleration developed by Harmut Rosa and using the idea of conflicting temporalities in the study of social-ecological systems, this article analyzes how the political will to accelerate the Great Green Wall reveals power dynamics between Western and Sahelian countries. We put in tension this acceleration of the Great Green Wall with (1) temporalities with respect to nature and reforestation, and (2) temporalities of life among the Sahelian populations. Whereas our contribution is mostly theoretical, building on Hartmut Rosa’s work, we illustrate our approach in terms of political ecology and anthropology based on an empirical case study of the Ferlo region in Senegal, a key region with respect to the Great Green Wall initiative. Our analysis shows that by controlling the temporality of the Great Green Wall program through this Accelerator, Western powers dominate the Sahelian states, making the Accelerator part of a neo-colonial approach. Moreover, the desire to accelerate the Great Green Wall with a massive investment in a short span of time corresponds to the perception of a nature made available, incompatible with the time of ecological restoration. Finally, the acceleration advocated by Western economic liberalism seems to be coming up against resistance of local populations rooted in an identity that values community solidarity, the stability of social structures, and closeness between humans, their herds, and nature.