Across the vast expanse of African Sahel, where the Sahara Desert meets the savannah grasslands, a silent war is being fought over humanity’s most precious resource: water. It stretches from Senegal to Eritrea, as lakes vanish, wells dry up, and communities clash over the last remaining drops.
Lake Chad was once a massive inland sea of about 25,000km², now it has shrunk by 84% to less than 4,000km² In a region where annual rainfall ranges from just 200 to 1,200mm while potential evapotranspiration demands 1,500 to 2,500mm, every drop becomes precious. Each well or watering point can become the trigger for confrontation.
When the Rain Fails
The Sahel’s water crisis is driven by multiplication of forces. Climate change has fundamentally disrupted the region’s hydrological cycle. Droughts that were usually experienced once every decade now occur once in two years. The temperature of the region is rising 1.5 times faster than the global average, evaporating what little water remains.
The collapse cannot be entirely blamed on change in climate. Rapid population growth is also greatly pressuring dwindling resources. Niger’s population is expected to double by 2050, exponentially increasing demand for water in a region already on edge.
Environmental degradation adds to the spiral. As water points dry up, overgrazing intensifies around the few that remain, degrading soil and accelerating desertification. In Niger alone, up to 120,000 hectares of arable land are lost every year to advancing sand. The FAO(Food and Agriculture Organisation) describes the effect explicitly:
“shifting sand-dunes that swamp villages, wetlands, and fields.”
Human Face of The Water Wars
Beyond the statistics, the humanitarian catastrophes emanating from the water crisis is staggering. Diarrhoea diseases linked to unsafe water claim over 300,000 children under five each year. In Chad alone, over half the regions face acute malnutrition emergencies, affecting 1.3 million children.
Numbers of displaced people are exploding. According to UNHCR, more than 2.5 million people have been forced from their homes in the Sahel over the past decade, driven by a combination of climate shocks, conflict, and water-related resource violence, a figure that rose from just 217,000 in 2013 to over 2.1 million by late 2021. In Burkina Faso, 75% of displaced communities lack basic sanitation, leaving them exposed to disease.
Boubacar Maiga, a conflict mediator in Burkina Faso, recounts one such tragedy. In Kantiari, a dispute over dam access led to violence. “The farmers burnt many of the herders’ houses in retaliation and beat the herders with sticks. The farmers said they would not allow them to use the land for grazing animals again, and the herders fled the village.”
One of the worst examples was the 2018–2019 Yirgou massacre in Burkina Faso, in which many herders were killed by local vigilante groups after a deadly attack blamed on extremist militants. While the violence was framed as part of the broader fight against terrorism, it was rooted in longstanding local tensions, including disputes over water points and grazing lands between Fulani herders and Mossi farming communities. As security analyst Mahamadou Sawadogo explains, “When we have a close look at the conflicts in the east and central north, they are often related to access points for water and rich grazing areas.”
From Pastoral Clashes to Jihadist Exploitation
At the heart of these conflicts is a long-running tension between farmers and pastoralists. As farmland shifts north and grazing routes shift south due to desertification, centuries-old coexistence arrangements break down. Where there were once trade and cooperation, now there are raids and reprisals.
Water points have become strategic assets, many are now militarised. Jean Bosco Bazié from Eau Vive International in Burkina Faso describes the grim scene: “There are water points which are very militarised and that keep populations from accessing water sources.
It’s not just state forces. In Mali alone, at least 41 non-state armed groups operate. Many exploit resource tensions to gain local support, promising protection or access to water in exchange for loyalty.
Jihadist groups like JNIM and IS-Sahel have weaponised this desperation. In parts of Mali and Burkina Faso, they offer services the state no longer provides, water, food, and dispute mediation. In return, they gain recruits and territory.
For pastoralist communities, especially young men who fancy the chance to domination, jihadists offer both survival and a cause. Some groups even promise to restore traditional grazing rights, reversing years of government policies.
The Ripple Effects on Livelihoods and Landscapes
The economic toll is enormous. Nearly 98% of the Sahel’s population relies on agriculture and livestock. When water vanishes, so do livelihoods. Crop yields decline, herds die of thirst, and famine follows.
While earlier reports coming from the Sahel project a zone of relentless agricultural decline, recent trends in Burkina Faso suggest a positive outlook. According to 2024 figures from the Permanent Interstate Committee for Drought Control in the Sahel (CILSS), cereal production in Burkina Faso increased by over 5% compared to the previous season, with localised gains tied to better rainfall, improved government policies and resilience initiatives.
Sadly these gains remain fragile because of other underlying factors. In some provinces affected by conflict, child malnutrition remains extremely high, with over 110,000 children under five projected to suffer from severe acute malnutrition between August 2024 and July 2025. As UNICEF warns, climate shocks like droughts and floods continue to disrupt harvests, especially in areas where farmers cannot access improved seeds, fertilisers, or irrigation.
“Even when national yields rise, many communities are left behind,” notes a 2025 CILSS report. “Security conditions and uneven rainfall patterns can quickly reverse gains.”
In short, Burkina Faso’s agricultural outlook is improving, but unevenly and precariously.
Governance Gaps and Policy Failures
Experts agree that while climate is a key trigger, political failure and security breakdowns are the deeper roots of the Sahel’s water conflicts. Years of weak governance, inconsistent water policies, and the failure to enforce security in rural areas have created a vacuum often filled by violence.
In Nigeria, this vacuum allowed heavily armed herders, often carrying AK-47s, to overrun largely unarmed farming communities, leading to horrific incidents such as the Benue massacres, the Nimbo killings in Enugu, and other attacks across the Middle Belt region. Communities repeatedly report that they lack protection or justice, fuelling cycles of retaliation and displacement.
Valère Nzeyimana of FAO Africa highlights the institutional neglect:
“We need policies and strategies for water use before we can even think about financing.”
Patrick Youssef of the International Committee of the Red Cross warns that militarised control of water sources and inequitable distribution only deepen community tensions. He calls for local peace mechanisms and fair water governance as urgent priorities.
The International Crisis Group notes that official responses too often oversimplify the drivers of violence. In Mali, for instance, government policies that heavily favour sedentary agriculture over nomadic pastoralism have created resentment in the north and center, resentment that extremist groups exploit. But across the Sahel, the primary failure lies in the state’s inability to protect civilians, mediate disputes, and ensure justice, regardless of livelihood or ethnicity.
International Efforts and Limited Success
Over the years, certain international initiatives has offered hope. Like the UNESCO’s BIOPALT project which aims to restore the Lake Chad basin, and the African Union’s Water for Africa Initiative seeking long-term water security strategies. However, implementation has been patchy and often underfunded.
Sahel countries receive less than half the per capita humanitarian aid of non-conflict zones. This chronic shortfall in funding hampers long-term solutions, leaving communities stuck in unending cycles of crisis.
A Crisis Without Borders
The Sahel water scarcity does not respect international borders. Countries like Cameroon, Chad, Niger, and Nigeria compete for access to Lake Chad’s shrinking waters resources. Coordination of cross-border water governance is inherently difficult and politically sensitive.
But failure to cooperate could lead to more than just local disputes, it could trigger international instability, like what was averted in the nile conflict.
The Desperation of Survival
In 2006, during the Ethiopia’s “war of the well”, a villager told a researcher:
“Thirst forces men to this horror of war.”
The above quote captures what communities across the Sahel now live every day. Accessing water can be a deadly act.
Traditional mechanisms for conflict resolution have completely collapsed under the weight of desperation, displacement, and distrust. Neighbours have turn to enemies. Disputes once settled with dialogue now end in bloodshed.
Need for Action
The water wars in the Sahel are not just about scarcity. They reflect a deeper crisis, where environmental stress, poor governance, and economic desperation converge to threaten peace.
This is beyond humanitarian crisis; it’s a matter of regional and global stability. Without decisive action to improve governance, restore trust, and manage resources equitably, the crisis risks spreading.
Solutions exist. But they require more than donor pledges or quick fixes. The international community must invest in durable water systems, strengthen local institutions, and treat water access as a pillar of peace-building.
As water disappears, the stakes rise. Whether the world acts now or waits until the violence spills across more borders, will determine whether the Sahel remains a belt of crisis, or becomes a model for survival in an age of climate uncertainty.
