El Bayadh Province

El Bayadh Province—"The White" in Arabic, named for its chalky landscape—exemplifies carrying capacity overshoot. This Saharan Atlas province covers 5.76 million hectares, of which 99% is collective pasture and rangeland. By 1998, livestock density was ten times what the land could sustain. The result: esparto grass (halfah) zones shrank 30% between 2008 and 2024, from 240,000 hectares to 168,000. The steppe is being eaten faster than it regenerates.

The Ksour Mountains rise in red-ochre ridges across the province, and the Ouled Djellal sheep breed—prized across Algeria—still moves in traditional patterns with black tents and weekly markets. But the arithmetic of overgrazing is unforgiving. Halfah once represented Algeria's third most important agropastoral product, harvested for paper pulp, basketwork, rugs, and ropes. Now depleted forage has forced stock densities down not by choice but by collapse.

The Adaptation Fund is implementing a "Halfah Project" specifically targeting El Bayadh to build ecosystem resilience and support climate-smart livelihoods. In November 2025, the province was subdivided when El Abiodh Sidi Cheikh was carved out as a new administrative unit—a recognition that these territories are too vast for centralized management. El Bayadh demonstrates how pastoral commons, when unconstrained, can degrade their own resource base until the system forces correction through scarcity.