Like the better known megaliths in Europe they tend to have astronomical alignments and have been used as funerary monuments. Most of the megaliths point east and have male skeletons, but the few megaliths with female skeletons are oriented towards the west.
(Shameless plug, but for anyone interested in learning more about this sort of thing I have a podcast about the history of astronomy and one of the episodes is about the astronomy of Saharan and Sub-Saharan Africa [3].)
[1]: https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Two-keyhole-structures-i...
There's some fascinating fuel for imagination when you focus on the Sahara, and some very surprising features and remnants of life hanging on. The best example is Siwa, which is an utterly magical place to visit, and feels like a real edge of civiliation.
Climate change is always spoken about with negativity in the mainstream narrative. However, I always wondered whether more heat = more evaporation = more rain = more life; bringing regions like the Sahara (and periphery regions like the Sahel) back to life .
Makes you wonder whether - in an alternate timeline - if a Mongol messenger hadn't been backstabbed, Baghdad hadn't been sacked, and the Islamic world went on to become today's centre of science, finance, development, etc, wohether our current perception of climate change would be seen as a global positive and catalyst for life?
The present day situation is fascinating: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_humid_period#Present-d... : there is an ongoing "greening" which seems caused by global warming and CO2 increases!
However, a 2003 study estimated only 45% of the Sahara could be covered by vegetation, and a 2022 study found that it may not be sufficient to start another AHP: it just "lowers the threshold for orbital changes to induce Sahara greening"
Given that is started over 15 years ago and there seems to be significant differences between what countries report and what was actually done when the UN commissioned a report in 2020, it’s anyone guess what progress has actually been made.
In my opinion it’s probably around 10% or low teens now and would be lucky to double that by the end of the project in 2030.
The project will probably report a much higher number when it actually finishes.
Hopefully it will be funded to continue. It’s probably one of the most important global events environmental projects of the 21st century.
Specifically the higher percentages are in reported land reclamation out of the 100Ha goal, which was at 17.8Ha in the 2020 report. The 4% is a composite of all targets for the 2030 goals, of which the GGB is only one metric.
Be careful in taking these types of articles at face value.
It's not a wall, but similar idea
That said, if it will work long term in some of the countries, that would be great news.
I'm glad that it's still possible to destroy an ecosystem in order to replace it with something better. That would never fly in the US. We also have no need to produce more food, and our deserts are mostly beloved natural wonders.
Perhaps, yes. But the Sahara is expanding and reducing the livable area of land in those countries. That can only add to economic strife. On the other hand, building a green wall reduces or eliminates the expansion of the desert and also increases the amount of food available to those countries. I believe that would help reduce the strife between those countries. Yes there's risk of abuse but I think everyone wants to be self-sufficient and anything towards that is laudable.
> UN involvement makes it even worse.
Can you explain that further? The U.N. is terrible at directly preventing conflict (just look at Ukraine) but I think it has a decent track record of helping countries build their infrastructure.
> I'm glad that it's still possible to destroy an ecosystem
What? You think building green savannahs is destroying an ecosystem?
> That would never fly in the US.
I don't know about never but I do think it'd certainly be difficult.
> We also have no need to produce more food
I disagree. I think we have no appetite to produce more food right now, but the way we're currently growing food is rather asinine.
> and our deserts are mostly beloved natural wonders.
Mostly, yes. But I think there's plenty of deserts that aren't quite natural wonders.
A Google search will likely list articles citing the 2018 study from UofMaryland that showed approximately a 10% increase in the Sahara's area from 1902-2012, ignoring the portions of that study that said that breaking down by decade showed a reversal in the 1980's. https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/clim/31/9/jcli-d-...
Google maps timeview has a fun animation if you search for Sahara Desert. https://earthengine.google.com/timelapse/
Some UN agencies are very effective, particularly the ones that are basically run by Americans, such as the World Bank. The more third world countries participate in any given agency, the more of a tire fire it is.
I don't know about other U.N. agencies.
But I find Andrew Millison's youtube blogs [0] to be quite interesting on the subject. His blog about refugees [1] for example.
Let’s see some examples of well-run UN agencies ‘staffed by Americans’. I guarantee you they are a cesspool of corruption and bigotry.
This is a multinational project with clear benefits.
It is very different from flashy projects like airports no one uses.