Crossing Borders with Environmental Peacebuilding: Challenges and Visions for West Africa
Date & Time
Jun 9, 2026 |
11.00
- 12.30
Link
https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_Wu3OvjsDRvS7WjCbBRmtxQ
Participants
Chair: Sophia Stanger, Austrian Centre for Peace (Austria)
Paul Oumarou Koalaga, Institut de Stratégie et de Relations Internationales (Burkina Faso)
Mohamed A. Dicko, Boya Consulting (Mali)
Zara Goni, World Bank (Nigeria)
West Africa faces a complex nexus of environmental degradation, climate change, and insecurity. Erratic rainfall, rising temperatures, and prolonged droughts disrupt food systems, drive displacement, and fuel violent conflict. Competition over scarce resources has sharpened tensions, for instance between farmers, herders, and fishing communities. In this round table discussion, we will shed light on examples of the Lake Chad Basin, Mali and Northern Burkina Faso, their differences and similarities.
The experts discuss possible approaches to the current challenges, with a particular focus on cross-border collaboration and meaningful community engagement, such as collaborative natural resources management. The roundtable will explore opportunities to foster peaceful youth engagement, as well as how to improve the involvement of women in environmental peacebuilding activities. By discussing these different approaches, the roundtable contributes to creating a vision of environmental peacebuilding that is relevant to the West African context but also provides valuable insights for other regions in the world.
Environmental Peacebuilding Lessons from Burkina Faso (IN FRENCH)
Paul Oumarou Koalaga, Institut de Stratégie et de Relations Internationales (Burkina Faso)
Environmental Peacebuilding Lessons from the Lake Chad Region
Zara Goni, World Bank (Nigeria)
Environmental Peacebuilding Lessons from Niger and Mali (IN FRENCH)
Mohamed A. Dicko, Boya Consulting (Mali)