Located on the Atlantic coast of West Africa, Senegal has approximately 197,000 square kilometers and 16 million inhabitants. It is a Sahelian country with a vast expanse of land bordered by the Sahara Desert to the north and the Sudanese savannah to the south. Despite an arid and hot climate with strong seasonal variations in rainfall and temperature, the country has over 80,000 ha of forest cover. For millennia, an unmistakable feature of the landscape has been a tree revered across the country for its beauty, its majestic character – which is a source of spirituality – and for the many premium products and uses it offers. The baobab (Adansonia digitata), with its distinctive trunk and branches, is famous like few other tree species.

In Senegal, the baobab species occupies a very important place in the forest heritage and contributes significantly to rural subsistence and to the local and national economy. The seeds, fibers and hulls of baobab fruits are also valuable components of “organic” products used in industry and agriculture – these are important uses and many do not require cutting down of the trees. Traditionally, despite heavy use of its non-wood products such as pruning for “aerial” fodder and harvesting of its leaves, local people have not made significant use of the wood from baobab for local crafts or services, mainly because of its spongy characteristics that do not lend themselves to making furniture or for construction. Since 2009, 100 tonnes of raw pulp and 50 tonnes of baobab seeds have been processed annually into powder and oil respectively for export (Sanogo and Tamba, 2012). However, this strong growth in external demand is contrasted by baobab’s limited use at the national level, which is also conditioned by the partially protected status attributed to it by the State.

Increasingly, like the fate of several species of trees and plants in this region of Africa, climatic and human activities are straining the resilience of the baobab and sometimes its very existence. Drought, soil degradation, recurrent bush fires, pruning for “aerial” fodder, harvesting leaves, the construction of roads and production tracks have progressively compromised its capacity to regenerate naturally and hamper its preservation. In Senegal to date, the tree mortality rate is not compensated by natural regeneration and even less by plantations (Diallo, 2016).

This precarious situation could be transformed if the value of baobab at different levels was fully recognized. Despite its richness in valuable properties, a key factor that has traditionally deterred further investment in its cultivation is the time it takes for the tree to bear fruit. Indeed, with little or no other forms of employment, savings or income and virtually no access to finance, local populations are unable to wait until the end of a decades-long reproductive cycle to harvest its products. However, since 2018, the department of Koungheul, in central Senegal, has been the site of an experiment which could lead to a gentle revolution in the productivity of the baobab tree, and with it the fortunes of the local populations.

Using rootstocks grown in a nursery on the premises of the “Office des Eaux et Forêts” de Koungheul, I worked diligently with a team of forest officers and nursery assistants on a grafting programme. The first results in terms of reducing the time it takes for the tree to bear fruit have been very encouraging. These results also offer hope that the success of this approach could contribute significantly to the economic development of Koungheul and its surroundings, by offering local communities a major commercial advantage: the production of quality baobab fruits from healthy plants selected in sufficient quantity and harvested in a very short period of time. In the past, grafting and large-scale planting of baobab has not been attempted in Senegal due to a lack of will. The technique we are using is modelled on a technical sheet produced by the Support for the Economic Development of Casamance programme and the Senegalese Institute for Agricultural Research, supported by the National Fund for Agricultural and Agri-Food Research.

The objectives of our programme are as follows:

• Shorten the period of operation – from planting to harvest – in order to stabilize the fruiting period of the species which, after grafting, would decrease from 15–20 years to 3–5 years.

• In the medium term (five years), make baobab grafts available to the local population and in particular to local community groups active in the development of forest fruit trees in baobab plantations to enable them to produce baobab fruits of sufficient quality and quantity.

• Significantly improve the nutritional quality and availability of food for communities and their ability to diversify their incomes, by adding baobab to the range of locally cultivated crops such as groundnuts, millet or maize.

We believe that if developed and applied on a very large scale or at the national level, the grafting technique could provide a credible alternative to the current income-generating activities of local communities and also stimulate both the renewal of the aging park of baobabs and the productivity of the species.

However, a critical initial hurdle is the lack of financial resources and logistical infrastructure to collect and distribute the transplants in areas beyond Koungheul. This is why, with the exception of the Ndiongolor and Niakhar varieties in the Fatick region, a lack of means of transport has prevented us from travelling to other regions to expand the range of graft harvesting.

Targeted investment would pay off on a number of fronts. Improved baobab plants could be distributed and made available to local communities and would be easy to popularize. The technique could also be supported equally by women and men. The initial user expenses could be covered in the form of loans or grants. At the regional and national level, large-scale tree planting would help stem desertification and reverse land degradation, providing a powerful strategic addition to Senegal’s programmes for adapting to climate change.

As the global appetite for baobab products continues to grow, Senegal is technically prepared to respond with increased sustainable supplies, if supported by sustainable access to finance for cultivation and training.

Lieutenant Aly Bocoum, December 2021, Baobab special feature

Bocoum, A. 2021. Production of baobab plants improved by grafting technique in a nursery, Department of Koungheul, Region of Kaffrine, Republic of Senegal.