News of 19/08/2025
The Women’s Network for Environmental Rights (REFEDE-Mali) organised a national preparatory workshop for Désertif’actions 2026, with support from GIZ. The workshop brought together around fifty participants to identify ways of supporting farms and livestock farms in their transition to greater resilience in the face of drought.
Droughts and recurrent land degradation are a major challenge for Mali, compromising agricultural production and food security and threatening social cohesion.
REFEDE-Mali is committed to collective responsibility, promoting more resilient, sustainable and inclusive farming and pastoral systems for a better future for generations to come.
GIZ is committed to supporting solutions based on agro-ecology and the diversification of resources and sources of income, putting agricultural producers at the heart of these concerns.
Present at the workshop, Soumana Fofana, representative of the Minister for the Environment, Sanitation and Sustainable Development, recalled that “Mali is facing desertification, land degradation and drought caused by climate change, all of which threaten food security”, and called on people to abandon practices that are harmful to the environment, including abusive logging, overgrazing and illegal gold panning.
A collaborative process for building advocacy
The workshop provided an opportunity for exchanges, group work and recommendations between various environmental stakeholders, with a view to preparing Mali’s voice at the Désertif’actions 2026 Summit. The final report of the workshop in Mali can be found on the Désertif’actions website.
The President of REFEDE-Mali reflects on the workshop
Watch an interview with Mrs Kouyaté Goundo Sissoko, President of REFEDE-Mali
To find out more about REFEDE-Mali
The Women’s Network for Environmental Rights (REFEDE-Mali) is a network of women’s civil society organisations. Created in 2013, REFEDE-Mali aims to strengthen environmental justice and the right to sustainable development and equitable management of access to natural resources in Mali. REFEDE-Mali represents the Sahel Desertification Network (ReSaD) in Mali.
