A hope for Africa: The Great Green Wall Project

In 1995/96, eight years after the invention of the Delfino and Treno plows, greatly annoyed by the fact that the system did not receive the consideration it deserved to alleviate the severity of human and environmental situation over vast areas of the planet, Venanzio Vallerani published a plan for a project, “La Lutte contre la Detersification (LCD) et la Rehabilitation de l’Environnement (RE) au Sahel avec le Vallerani System”. The draft was distributed to the FAO, IFAD, the Italian, Swiss, German, French, Swedish, Portuguese and Spanish Cooperation, some NGOs and Consulting.
The project proposed structure of action, costs and projected results for working with the VS in the Sahel on a front of six thousand kilometers to a depth of 15 km to be implemented over 6 years.
The estimated costs of the purchase of 260 Mechanization Units (UMVS), processing and sowing of about 2 billion microbasins and other interventions. Totalling 370 million USD, would have allowed for a very important green belt for all the states in the Sahelian zone, having a positive impact everywhere.
The iniciative would have thwarted the abandonment of land, hunger, poverty; and would have allowed for the infiltration of 4 to 6 billion cubic meters of rain (each microbasin collects 1mc of water per 100mm of rain water) into the groundwater.

La Grande Muraglia Verde

 

Since the cost included 50% more for spare parts, after six years much of the material could have been used at low costs for years to come.

That futuristic plan has now become very relevent in the new awareness that governments and international organizations have developed around the need for effective interventions capable of triggering a virtuous circle through the reforestation of vast areas of degraded land.

Consegna Medaglia

Meanwhile, the VS has been subjected to:
- a scientific examination by the ” International Center for Agricultural Research of Dry Areas” (ICARDA) funded by the Swiss Cooperation concluding “Excellent results” and formulating a proposal to implement the plan in partnership with Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya and Mauritania (October 2006). link

- an experimental application on a large scale in northern China of the “Project for Afforestation of a Pilot Area” through the application of the Vallerani System Technology in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region between The State Forestry Administration of China (SFA) and The Italian Ministry of the Environment and Territory (IMET)”.

The project provided the processing of 1000ha. Following the excellent results achieved, 3200 have been tillered and Dr. Vallerani has been appointed: “Professor Onoris Causa for the prevention and combating of desertification” by the Inner Mongolia Academy of Forestry (AFIP) and the University of Ulun Beir; “Special Advisor for Accademy forestry inventory and planning of state forestry administration” of the Chinese Ministry of Forestry; President Hu Jintao awarded him with the “Certificate of Friendschip” the highest honor bestowed by the Chinese government to a foreigner.

For more information see the labor relations in the documents section.

It concludes by emphasizing once again, where necessary, that the proposals of the project in 1996, were perfectly suited to the interventions implemented to date.
In refference to the system we may note that it allows to face:
- the problems related to the three UN Conventions;
- in a reasonable time, related to the number of Units of Mechanization of VS (UMVS);
- in the best and most natural way;
- with cost 4-5 times lower than those currently incurred in the fight against desertification.