Since 1945, all along the coast, running from Dakar to St Louis, she-oaks have been planted (a tropical tree of the Causaurina family), mainly to stabilize the soil and also to prevent silting-up with sand. This operation which was reinforced by the state during the 1970’s, now protects the Nyayes. This region is a strategic zone in the form of a coastal strip 10 to 15 km long, that has very favourable conditions (basins with flowing water, for example) for horticulture. Its natural advantages have made it the garden patch for the country, it’s said that two-thirds of the vegetables consumed in Senegal are grown in this region.

Today this ecosystem, which thanks to market gardening has avoided a rural exodus, is under a new threat. The she-oaks are getting old, carters have come to extract sand from the coast to satisfy the building boom in Dakar, a substantial number of trees have been cut without replanting, garbage is dumped, and houses have been built completely illegally.

A project to protect this strip of she-oaks is therefore a crucial program for the region and the country. In March 2011, the National Centre for Forestry Research launched a project for the production and evaluation of by-products from the she-oaks in the Nyayes zone.