water and the local population obstructed the flow in the channels and installed fish-traps. Since 2003, a German aid organization, Mali-Nord, have financed the construction of irrigated areas that leave the flow of water in the channels unimpeded. In 2006 the Government of Mali created the "Office pour la Mise en Valeur du système Faguibine" (OMVF) to maintain the channels and to stabilize the sand dunes by planting Euphorbia balsamifera and eucalyptus. Much of the vegetation that stabilized the dunes perished in the drought that started in the late 1970s. As a result, sand is blown and washed into the channels. The sill at Kamaïna is next to large dunes and is particularly vulnerable to the accumulation of sand. Starting in 2002, the local villages cooperated in removing the sand and since 2006 the efforts have been coordinated by the OMVF and supported by the World Food Program. In October 2008, around a 1000 people worked for 6 days to clear the sand. In a project funded by the government of Norway, the United Nations Environment Program is studying the Lake Faquibine ecosystem and looking at ways in which the management of land and the hydrological cycle could be improved. The project is planned to run between 2008 and 2015 with an initial budget of 1 million USD. Annual maximum height (in meters) of the Niger River at the Diré hydrological station Notes References . . Also published in French with the title Le Niger: une Artère vitale. Gestion efficace de l’eau dans le bassin du Haut Niger. . Further reading . External links Drying of Lake Faguibine at NASA Earth Observatory . An incomplete draft dated 02-10-2008 of an English version of the Hamerlynck UNEP document. Mali-Nord: a German foreign aid program funded by Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) and Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW) that has been operating in northern Mali since 1994. Mostly in German but a few files in French and one in English by Andrew Dillon: Measuring the Programme Mali-Nord’s Impact. Faguibine