India: Crescent-shaped Dams to Harvest the Monsoon
Nicknamed The Water Man of India, the activist Rajendra Singh was honored, in 2015, with a Stockholm Water Prize, an award that recognizes individuals who have implemented sustainable solutions to preserve water. In Rajasthan, he revived the construction of johad, small ancestral dams made of earth and stone in crescent shapes. Built across slopes to capture runoff water during the monsoon, they recharge the groundwater aquifers. Since 1985, 8600 johad have been erected thanks to his NGO, Tarun Bharat Sangh. About a thousand villages have thus regained access to water.
Burkina Faso: Termites to the Rescue
In the 1980s, Yacouba Sawadogo, a Burkinabé farmer, rediscovered a traditional technique: zaï. The principle: dig holes 20 to 30 centimeters deep in the soil, fill them with compost to attract insects, notably termites, which create underground galleries. In times of rain, these galleries guide water deeply into the soil. This technique, which can dramatically boost agricultural yields, has been recognized as being of national utility by the government: it is now used across the country.
Algeria: A Vital Underground Network
For more than a thousand years, the foggara, gentle-sloped underground galleries that convey water from aquifers without the help of a pump, have fed the oases of the Algerian Sahara, in the Touat, Gourara, and Tidikelt regions. Yet they are in danger, as numerous unsanctioned boreholes dry up the aquifers, even though a law has regulated them since 2005. In 2025, Algiers announced the release of about 1.3 million euros to restore part of the country’s 1400 foggara.
➤ Article published in GEO magazine no. 569, “Replenishing in Auvergne,” July 2026.
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