Stories written by Koffigan E. Adigbli

Developing Senegal’s Urban Agriculture

Watering cans in hand, men and women move back and forth between the wells and water storage tanks and the crops they're watering: carrots, onions, tomatoes, cabbage, and potatoes, as well as fruit trees like palm, coconut, papaya and banana trees.

Village Project Helps Rural Producers in Senegal

Increased harvests in the northern Senegalese community of Léona provide evidence of the benefits of multifaceted support for agriculture. But as their yields grow, farmers are calling for consistent policy to protect markets for their crops.

Biomass Plant Lights up Rural Senegal

A new power plant in the eastern Senegalese village of Kalom is generating more than just electricity. Powered by agricultural waste, the station has lit up homes, lightened women's domestic burdens and even put a little money in some residents' pockets.

Senegalese Cooperative Gives Youth Reasons to Stay at Home

Like many other young Senegalese, Pape Mokhtar Diallo long dreamed of escaping his rural home in northern Senegal for a better life. Three times he tried and failed to go overseas. But the establishment of an agricultural cooperative here in the village of Boyinadji has put another dream within his grasp.

Eco-Villages Breathe New Life Into Rural Senegal

Eighty-odd kilometres outside Dakar, the Senegalese capital, solar power and an irrigation scheme are transforming a traditional village into what the government hopes will be a model for the future of the countryside.

Cashew Producers’ Pain Is Intermediaries’ Gain in Senegal

Cashew nut growers in the southern Senegalese region of Casamance are complaining bitterly that intermediaries are cutting them out of a fair share of the profits.

Senegal’s Investment in Rural Youth Bearing Fruit

Darou Ndoye is the sort of village young people cannot wait to leave in search of better prospects in the city or across the seas in Europe. But 40 youth working on 10 hectares of a 20-heactre farm here in western Senegal show how a little support goes a long way in creating rewarding work in rural Senegal.

One of the female candidates is Amsatou Sow Sidibé, a law professor at Dakar

SENEGAL: Two Women Among 14 Candidates for President

There are two women among the 14 candidates contesting the first round of Senegalese presidential elections that will be held on Feb. 26. But according to several analysts, this overwhelmingly Muslim West African country is not ready to be governed by a woman.

POLITICS-SENEGAL: Violence After Validation of Wade Candidacy

It was stones against tear gas in the Senegalese capital this morning as students protested the killing of one of their own on Tuesday evening. At least four people have died since Jan. 27, in wider demonstrations against the controversial validation of President Abdoulaye Wade's candidacy for re-election for a third term.

Senegal is supporting the construction of thousands of biodigesters by local masons.  Credit: Zach Swank/Peace Corps

WEST AFRICA: Households Turning to Cow Dung for Energy

There are dusty barrels carefully positioned outside many of the family compounds in the Léona neighbourhood of Kaolack, a city of 20,000 in western Senegal: signs of success for a project to introduce the use of biogas as a source of fuel. Amadou Faye, whose family herds cows, goats and sheep as well as growing groundnuts on the side, is among the early adopters.

Hepatitis vaccines are a key element in controlling the disease. Credit:  Bios/Wikicommons

HEALTH: Battling Hepatitis in West Africa

West African health experts are calling for governments to take the prevalence of hepatitis B and C more seriously, and to act to reduce the cost of treatment as part of more effective control of the disease.

SENEGAL: Fish Farming Breathes New Life Into Rural Economy

July signals the start of three months of intense activity for residents of the seven villages around the small dam at Sébi Ponty. The dam was stocked with tilapia in 2006, and aquaculture is proving to be a vital economic activity for youth in the area.

Senegalese boy with locusts. Credit:  IRIN

WEST AFRICA: Building a Regional Response to Locusts

The period between May and August is when farmers in the West African Sahel fear the arrival of swarms of locusts. This year, efforts to limit the devastation will be strengthened by coordination across the region thanks to the Africa Project to Combat Locust Invasions.

Commemorating the 10th aniversary of a declaration abandoning FGM in the town of Malicounda Bambara: progress elsewhere has been slow. Credit: Heba Aly/IRIN

Slowly Winning Fight Against FGM in Northern Senegal

The harm done by female genital mutilation is still enormous in Podor, a city in the north of Senegal, say officials at the local hospital. While the practice is declining slightly, some religious leaders in the region still support it.

Harvesting rice in Senegal: irrigation projects have greatly improved yields and incomes. Credit:  Olivier Epron/Wikicommons

SENEGAL: Small-Scale Irrigation: Key to Rural Development

Over the past four years, the Local Small-scale Irritation Project has spent more than $10.5 million U.S. dollars supporting rural communities in Senegal.

ECONOMY-SENEGAL: ‘Only The Rich Get Loans’

Despite the financial sector boom in Senegal, small and medium sized businesses (SMBs), which represent over 90 percent of the industrial fabric of the country, struggle to access funding for their development, their representatives claim.

SENEGAL: Farmers Anxious About Aid

As part of a project to support community initiatives and fight poverty in South Senegal, the Sédhiou Local Development Fund received a donation of agricultural equipment worth more than half a million dollars in a bid to reverse the region's dramatic drop in agricultural production in recent years.

New varieties of groundnuts that are suited to the local soil and climate are part of arresting falling production. Credit:  ICRISAT

AGRICULTURE-SENEGAL: Groundnut Production in Freefall

Farmers are complaining about a lack of technical assistance and the poor quality of seeds they've planted this year in the Kaolack region, Senegal's groundnut-producing area, 200 kilometres south of the capital Dakar.

Processing shea butter in Ghana: women in the region are building on traditional knowledge to improve production. Credit:  Kenneth S. Yussif

DEVELOPMENT-AFRICA: Women in Pursuit of Knowledge

While Africa is still far from having adequate capacity for scientific innovation, women are more and more present in the field of research for the continent's sustainable development.

There are just seven doctors for every 100,000 people in Senegal; just one midwife for every 400,000 people. Credit:  Dima Gavrysh/UNFPA

HEALTH-SENEGAL: Fistula Sufferers Left To Their Fate

In Senegal's southern region, 58 percent of deliveries take place at home without any medical assistance, according to state reproductive health officials in Kolda, a town 425 km from the capital, Dakar. Women in the region suffer from exceptionally high rates of fistula.



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