Master Plan for Coordination of Programmes for Combating Desertification / Natural Resources Management in the ECOWAS Sub-region: Cape Verde, Mauritania, Senegal, Gambia, Guinea Bissau, Guinea, Mali, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Togo, Benin, Niger, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Cote d'Ivoire

This report, prepared in collaboration with ECOWAS, ECA, and UNDP, presents a regional Master Plan to coordinate desertification control and natural resource management across West Africa. Developed by a multidisciplinary team of agroforestry and environmental experts, it assesses the institutional, environmental, and socio-economic dynamics within ECOWAS member states. The report emphasizes the need to harmonize overlapping and often conflicting national and subregional strategies, such as NEAPs, TFAPs, and NPACDs. It proposes a phased implementation approach centered on integrated river basin development, agroforestry promotion, ecosystem monitoring, and community-level interventions in land rehabilitation, water, energy, and livestock management. The document critiques fragmented international aid mechanisms, highlights development disparities between northern and southern ECOWAS countries, and calls for stronger institutional capacities, legal reforms, and coherent policy integration.