Fighting the Sand Dunes
El Toma Abdel Maruf used to make her sons in the city laugh when she told them that they might one day find themselves buried under the sand.
But for Maruf and many other residents of El Shababit, who have had to relocate several times due to the encroaching desert in Sudan’s River Nile state, battling sand is an everyday challenge.
“In the old village, the sand dunes came and covered us, so we moved here. But now the dunes have come here too,” says Maruf, who laughs when asked how old she is but looks to be in her 50s.
With 58 percent of Sudan’s rural population living in poverty, many have fled to major towns and cities in search of work. Those left behind are at the forefront of the fight against climate change. “There was a sand dune that even a tractor could not get to the top of,” says Maruf.
Hippi Wei