The Strengthening Resilience of Africa’s Great Green Wall (SURAGGWA) programme was officially launched in Nouakchott, Mauritania, on 15 December 2025 through a partnership between the Government of Mauritania, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the Pan-African Agency of the Great Green Wall. The regional initiative brings together eight Sahelian countries—Burkina Faso, Chad, Djibouti, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria and Senegal—to address growing climate challenges affecting security, stability and sustainable development across the Sahel.
Approved by the Green Climate Fund in July 2025, SURAGGWA mobilizes a total investment of USD 222 million, including USD 150 million in GCF grants and USD 72 million in co-financing from participating countries and partners. The programme reflects strong political commitment to the Great Green Wall as a shared continental framework for enhancing climate resilience, restoring ecosystems and supporting sustainable livelihoods in one of the world’s most climate-vulnerable regions.
FAO described SURAGGWA as a transformative programme built around large-scale landscape restoration using agroecological and agroforestry practices, the development of non-timber forest product value chains to improve incomes and market access, and strengthened institutional capacity of national and regional Great Green Wall agencies. These efforts aim to rehabilitate degraded lands, promote financial inclusion—particularly for women—and improve coordination, planning and resource mobilization at both national and regional levels.
The programme is closely aligned with continental priorities and the objectives of the Great Green Wall initiative, positioning SURAGGWA as a model for tackling climate change, land degradation and biodiversity loss in the Sahel. Support from the Green Climate Fund was highlighted as a vote of confidence in Sahelian countries and their partners, with expectations of large-scale climate, environmental and socio-economic benefits.
SURAGGWA is expected to restore 1.3 million hectares of degraded land, improve resilient livelihoods for 5.7 million people and sequester 65 million tonnes of carbon-equivalent emissions. These outcomes will directly contribute to the Great Green Wall’s 2030 targets of restoring 100 million hectares, creating 10 million green jobs and sequestering 250 million tonnes of CO₂ equivalent.
Following the launch, the first meeting of the Regional Steering Committee was held on 16 December 2025, marking the start of coordinated regional governance for the programme. The committee will guide implementation, strengthen regional coordination and ensure alignment with the Pan-African Agency of the Great Green Wall’s Ten-Year Priority Investment Plan for 2021–2030.
