Accessibility links

Breaking News

To Curb Migration, EU Must Solve Sahel Population Boom, UN Says


In the Sahel belt of Chad, mothers wait for their children to be examined for signs of malnutrition. Governments in the region are struggling to provide food, schools and jobs to their growing populations.
In the Sahel belt of Chad, mothers wait for their children to be examined for signs of malnutrition. Governments in the region are struggling to provide food, schools and jobs to their growing populations.

The European Union should help countries in Africa's Sahel region tackle a population boom if it wants to keep more migrants from coming to its shores, a senior U.N. official said.

Toby Lanzer, humanitarian coordinator for the Sahel, said governments there are struggling to provide jobs, schools and food to the growing numbers that, the United Nations estimates, could triple to more 300 million by 2050.

"The challenge across the region is gigantic," Lanzer said in an interview Wednesday.

"In the coming 10-20 years we will see an ever-increasing number of migrants until the countries of Europe ... have a very frank conversation … about demography," he said, adding that the EU should also discuss trade and security to curb migration.

Toby Lanzer, humanitarian coordinator for the Sahel, speaks at a meeting on the Lake Chad basin in Abuja, Nigeria, June 8, 2016.
Toby Lanzer, humanitarian coordinator for the Sahel, speaks at a meeting on the Lake Chad basin in Abuja, Nigeria, June 8, 2016.

Italian data on sea arrivals so far this year show a sharp increase in migrants from several African countries including Mali, Senegal and Nigeria.

Last year, the EU launched a $2 billion fund for Africa to combat the poverty and conflicts that are driving people to migrate to Europe. It has also proposed making development aid conditional on governments' cooperation in curbing migration.

Lanzer commended politicians like Niger's President Mahamadou Issoufou for advocating what he referred to as a "demographic transition" in his re-election speech in April.

In Niger, the lowest-ranking country on the U.N. human development index, the average woman has more than seven children.

However, the question of family planning is sensitive in many parts of the Sahel, where polygamy is widely accepted.

"The conversation is starting to move in the right direction across the Sahel, but it still has some way to go," Lanzer added.

  • 16x9 Image

    Reuters

    Reuters is a news agency founded in 1851 and owned by the Thomson Reuters Corporation based in Toronto, Canada. One of the world's largest wire services, it provides financial news as well as international coverage in over 16 languages to more than 1000 newspapers and 750 broadcasters around the globe.

XS
SM
MD
LG