About two-thirds of Africans depend on agriculture for their livelihoods. The fate of agricultural production, therefore, directly affects economic growth, social improvement, and trade in Africa. As the region's population continues to grow rapidly, outpacing the growth rate in other regions of the world, its agriculturalland is becoming increasingly degraded. Farmers are intensifying land use to meet food needs without proper management practices and external inputs.

Agriculture is vital to the economies of Sub-Saharan Africa: two-thirds of the region’s people depend on it for their livelihoods. Nevertheless, agricultural productivity in most of the region is stagnant or declining, in large part because of land degradation. Soil erosion and soil nutrient depletion degraded almost 70 percent of the region’s land between 1945 and 1990; 20 percent of total agricultural land has been severely degraded. If left unchecked, land degradation could seriously threaten the progress of economic growth and poverty reduction in Africa.

In 2011 two United Nations bodies adopted ambitious goals for halting land degradation and achieving sustainable development. These goals will be difficult, but not impossible, to meet. The evidence presented here suggests several avenues for achieving a world with no land degradation. First, efforts to promote sustainable land management need to improve local and national governance while also enhancing international cooperation.

Community-based Natural Resource Management (NRM) is increasingly becoming an important approach for addressing natural resource degradation in low income countries. This study analyzes the determinants of enactment, awareness of and compliance with by-laws related to Natural Resource Management (NRM) in order to draw policy implications that could be used to increase the effectiveness of by-laws in managing natural resources sustainably. We found a strong association between awareness and compliance with NRM bylaws.

Ce document vise à contribuer au programme d’action en cours pour le développement de l’Afrique au sud du Sahara.