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Mauritania
Index
Figure 8. Grain Production, 1973-85
Although it is a large country, most of Mauritania is desert.
In the late 1980s, arable land was scarce, and, except for some
oases, crop production was limited to a narrow band along the
southern borders with Senegal and Mali. Farmers practiced four
types of agriculture: rain-fed dryland cropping, called
dieri; flood recession cropping along the Senegal River
and its seasonal tributaries, called oualo; oasis
cultivation, the least important; and modern irrigated
agriculture.
The most important methods, dieri and oualo,
were entirely dependent on limited and erratic rainfall and on
the annual flooding of the Senegal River and its only perennial
tributary in Mauritania, the Gorgol River. Dieri
cultivation occurred during the rainy season, from June-July to
September-October, in areas receiving sufficient precipitation
(400 to 450 millimeters annually) to grow millet and peas.
Oualo plantings occurred during the cold dry season from
November to March, to take advantage of ground moisture as the
flood waters of the Senegal and Gorgol rivers receded. Sorghum
was the major crop for this season. Oasis cultivation drew its
water from subterranean sources and so was not dependent on
rains. Indeed, areas where oases were located might not
experience any significant rainfall for years. Modern irrigated
agriculture was only partially dependent on annual rainfall. It
depended primarily on dams to retain water from the annual rise
on the rivers resulting from rains falling upriver. For the
Senegal River, these rains fell principally in the headwaters in
eastern Mali and Guinea.
The two major droughts of the African Sahel were prolonged in
Mauritania by intermittent dry spells. The result was a serious
decline in overall agricultural production. In the 1960s,
Mauritania had produced about one-half of its grain needs. By the
1983-85 period, grain harvests had fallen to a level that met
only about 3 to 8 percent of the country's grain needs. The
cereal deficits have been filled through a combination of
commercial imports and international food aid, of which the
United States has been the principal donor. During the most
serious drought years, from 1983 to 1985, food aid accounted for
over 61 percent of Mauritania's available supply of grain,
commercial imports of rice by the government covered
approximately 20 percent, and imports of flour by private traders
provided another 13 percent. Local production was able to cover
only 5 percent of need. In the following three years, local
production recovered sufficiently to meet about one-third of the
annual grain need, estimated in 1986 at 260,000 tons. In that
year, local production covered 35 percent of need, government
imports supplied 30 percent, and food aid met 35 percent.
Although accurate data were lacking, production of all grains
in the recovery years from 1985 to 1987 rose to between 68,000
and 120,000 tons, a large increase over the record low of
approximately 20,000 tons in 1984
(see
fig. 8). Thus, gross
production between 1985 and 1987 attained levels not matched
since the mid-1960s. Rising population in the interim meant that,
despite this significant recovery, the country remained dependent
on imported grains to satisfy its needs.
Data as of June 1988
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