Kolda Region
Kolda's Upper Casamance recovers from 40-year conflict with 2022 peace, demining operations restoring land for peanut production that reached 200,000+ tonnes.
Kolda spans Upper Casamance where the conflict that divided southern Senegal for four decades has largely concluded, the 2022 peace agreement enabling recovery that landmines and displacement long prevented. The region contributed over 200,000 tonnes of peanuts alongside Kaffrine, Kaolack, and Fatick in 2023/2024—the agricultural production that peace enables returning.
Demining operations by CNAMS continue clearing the 2 million+ square meters of land already restored in Ziguinchor, Sédhiou, and Kolda regions. The mines not only impede development but deter displaced populations from returning, the land access that demining gradually restores enabling the agricultural livelihoods that conflict interrupted.
Civil society coordination through COSCPAC (spanning Kolda, Sédhiou, Ziguinchor, Guinea-Bissau, and Gambia) addresses the cross-border dimensions that Casamance's geography creates. Whether post-conflict development can restore the agricultural and tourism potential that four decades of fighting destroyed—or whether the region remains marked by conflict's legacy—depends on sustained peace and investment.