The main objectives of the Keita Project are to increase food security and reverse desertification in the Ader, Doutchi and Maggia valleys of Keita Department, an area which faced environmental collapse from the 1970s; a secondary objective is to thereby to reduce the high rate of migration from this region to Italy.
The methods used have included reforestation and land reclamation, building new infrastructure, setting up peasants' associations, and providing technical and financial assistance.
However, desertification has continued to some degree and food security has not been fully achieved due to very high population growth.
The PDR-ADM operated in: reclamation of plateaux and abandoned lands in the valleys for agricultural and pastoral purposes, reforestation of slopes, of the koris banks and dunes, creation of wind breaks and forest areas, control of the water flow in the koris by banks consolidation and small dams.
The environmental status before the beginning of the project testifies the negative impact of climate and anthropic pressure on the ecosystems.
Even if the same dynamics are observed in the entire Sahelian part of Niger, this trend has only reached such results in Keita, because of the PDR-ADM intervention and the control of the human pressure on natural resources.
In addition to wooden natural vegetation recovery, there has also been an evident increase of agricultural surfaces (about 80%) resulting of the substitution of large grassland areas (decreased about 70%) and of PDR-ADM land reclamation interventions (about 12.000 ha).
In this context, the territory monitoring in the aspects that could indicate a reactivation of the desertification is very important, especially in this phase where the environment is slowly recovering equilibrium.
Vis-à-vis with these variations, the pressure on the natural resources also strongly increased generally more than productions, as demonstrate by population and livestock growth about 50% during the period.