WHAT NIGER, FUTURE A CASEFOR IN POINT THE WESTERN SAHEL?
FIGURE 13. Compared Projections, 1996 and 2019
Source: Data: UNDESA/ Population Division, 1997, 2019.
Niger has consistently been a major recipient of international food aid (fig. 14).65 Shipments of this type of humanitarian aid have greatly varied over time, responding largely to needs created by erratic rainfall and armed conflict. By 2035, according to a recent study, the country’s annual dry cereal deficit is projected to increase to almost one-third of Niger’s current yearly consumption—a deficit that even heroic investments in irrigation may not fully stem. 66 As prospects in agricultural and livestock-related livelihoods diminish, young adults will increasingly look to rural non-agricultural and urban sectors for employment, where job growth so far has been slow. A recent labor assessment suggests that about two-thirds of the country’s 15-to-24 year-olds are not, at present, being educated, employed, or trained.67 By 2045, today’s population of
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Nigerien children, adolescents, and young adults is projected to expand the country’s prime-aged workforce (aged 25 to 54 years) to nearly three times its current level.68 Demographers see the results of recent cell-phone surveys in Niger as a hopeful harbinger of changing reproductive behavior. In Niamey, the country’s capital city, about one-third of married women are currently using modern contraception. As elsewhere, the wealthiest and most educated women are contraception’s most frequent users.69 Despite these signs of progress, many analysts wonder if contraceptive use might be spreading too slowly in Niger and if fertility decline is emerging several decades too late.