Project to Help African Farming Villages Seeks Partners Across
much of sub-Saharan Africa, parts of Asia, Australia, the Middle
East, and the United States, the deserts are expanding at
alarming rates, relentlessly consuming once-fertile agricultural
lands and entire communities. This urgent global issue,
“desertification,” has been called “the greatest environmental
challenge of our time” by the United Nations University, which
projects that it will soon affect close to one-third of the
earth’s land surface. In regions of Northern Africa, once
forested areas are now deserts, and with no trees to act as
windbreaks, the sand is submerging acres of nutrient-rich
agricultural land—taking away millions of rural villagers’ homes
and livelihoods. The effects of desertification, and the results
from the VRAI model to restore agricultural land. The Village
Reforestation and Advancement Initiative (VRAI) was created to
reverse this desert creep, reestablish arable land and create
vibrant local economies. The first ste