Can India's Great Green Wall stop desertification?

Planting Great Green Walls in an attempt to restore dry land has become a continental effort, led by governments and NGOs in both Africa and China. Now India has ambitious plans to do the same. But planting and sustaining millions of trees in water scare locations is a huge and complicated undertaking. To regenerate plant life at scale, what can India do differently?

#PlanetA #GreatGreenWall #desertification

Credits:
Reporter: Amelia Martyn-Hemphill
Supervising editor: Joanna Gottschalk, Malte Rohwer-Kahlmann & Michael Trobridge
Video Editor: Markus Mörtz
Thumbnail: Em Chabridon

Interviewees:
Neelam Ahluwalia, Aravalli Bachao Citizens Movement
Chetan Aggarwal, environmental analyst
Joseph Faluyi, COO and Executive Director of the Great Green Wall of Africa Foundation
George Taylor, desertification expert, University of Colorado
Latika Thukral, I am Gurgaon

Read more:

Chapters:
00:00 Intro
0:48 The advancing Thar desert
1:43 Causes of land degradation in India
4:00 India’s Great Green Wall
4:28 Examples from Africa and China
6:23 Is this a good idea for India?
8.55 Citizen movements achieving success
10:42 What needs to be done to save the Aravallis?

[DWPlanetA]

Do you know of any regreening projects in your area?

[ryn]

Andrew Millison did a great job documenting India's Paani foundation water cup contest, in which farmers fixed their local desertification, village by village, in just a couple of years. It's really impressive.

[RanveerSingh-nwhx]

I grew up in a village in the Shekhawati region of Eastern Rajasthan where the entire village was once surrounded by several small hills on each side, lending breathtaking views to the area. About 10 years ago, several mining companies starting blasting and mining one side of the hill and within 5 years the entire hill disappeared. I was shocked to see the impact on the area when I visited the village after a few years. The frequency of dust storms has increased significantly and a large part of the agricultural land is now almost barren. Rajasthan Govt. (and residents) really needs to do take urgent actions to prevent this from happening in other areas of the state.

[veggieboyultimate]

No point having a green wall if there are no strong environmental laws protecting it.

[sanirudha]

Im from Rajasthan and I can tell you that politics, illegal mining & widespread corruption has ensured zero progress on the ground. Construction and real estate business is on boom and businessmen are happy to support the upcoming election campaigns. Most of the so called NGOs are hand in gloves with these corrupt business lobbies.

[SaveMoneySavethePlanet]

5:42 conservation agriculture is also a really amazing solution for this problem. Not only does it reduce the amount of soil getting taken away by wind, but it also allows farmers to grow their crops with significantly less fertilizer which reduces the GHG required to grow our food!

[sidmishra]

So far as an Indian, I haven't seen this project in action till now. I live in NCR and the quality of air is degrading each year. Hopefully, the Government take strict action and more people come forward for this great cause.

[YoJesusMorales]

The expert on desertification didn't actually say anything about why it didn't had a good track record, was it inviable or just bad execution?

[coastofkonkan]

Re forestation efforts in last 20years have succeeded in parts of Maharashtra state so well that leopard population has increased & humans have suffered. Irrespective of results we still need green cover.

[ks]

These are the kinds of news reports we need rather than meaningless political debates.

[pranavgupta]

I live in Gurgaon but I never knew about this. Thank you DW!

[ecoideazventures]

Rajasthan has built a great tradition of conserving water through johads. They need to take the lead with such citizen initiatives

[SAmaryllis]

The transformation by the IamGurgaon group is amazing - loved seeing those before & after pictures!

[aleenaprasannan]

Razing down mountains and replacing it with a stretch of forest is the very embodiment of 'putting a bandaid'.

[speedyrenders]

2023 this year is unpredictable, As in January we receive very less Snowfall in North India, in March-April we receives heavy rainfall which destroyed crops(wheat) heavily, In May-June summer breaks up the record in Delhi, UP. Resulting in Forest Fires Burning hectares of Forest, Destroying WildLife, Even Flying birds falls down in Delhi and when the summer is going on, Kedarnath and Surrounding area were experiencing Snowfall in summers. These all were just Trailer and the climax was performed by Monsoon season with flash flood all over India. Himachal Pardesh was tremendously suffered by flash floods, Landslides destroying lives, cities, Ecosystem, Economy. The scene was completely unforgettable. But who cares, After Monsoon, Rapid unplanned develpment, Deforestation, Reducing Forest, Shortning of rivers, Mining, Deforestation, Road Construction, Tunnels, Hydro-Power projects in Himalayas all are going in their rapid.

Recently, Negativity between people is increasing rapidly in India, as you can see in Manipur, Haryana. When People are killed in the name of religion. So How can we expect Care of Environment.

Hope India to Revive I don't wants to Lose my Country its people, its Natue, Its Ecosystem, Its Environment, Diffrent cultures in India, Diffrent relegion in India.

[mrinalgautam]

Such enlightening videos should be shown on tv channels for common people to become aware!!

[d_san]

If you go to Google earth you would see how much of land is converted to farmland in India. Exception is kerala and north east states where farmland and forests coexist and look how the air quality and dust control is much better in these states

[motivate-today]

I remember stories about those dust storms in the 1960s and 1970s. Rampant corruption has also been a problem for many decades.

[himsincha]

its refreshing that someone is doing actual journalism. Someday I hope indian jounalist which are very capable, break their chains of government a**licking and do actual journalism like this, which affects everyone in the country if remain unchecked.

[captainnemo]

German media doing what Indian media should be doing. Thank You DW.