Timetable of the Mali ASP

June 2007: National NGO meeting: 21-22 June 2007, Bamako, 37 participants attended the National NGO Meeting. During the meeting the PMU gave an update on progress of the Mali ASP, there were presentations and dicussions on the activities of NGOs, functionality of the NGO network, and feedback on the NGO exchange event. Looking forward, discussion and workplans were established for NGO involvement beyond 2007, and the Secretariat was designated as PAN Mali with Sory Bamba as the National NGO Facilitator.

May 2007: Multistakeholder Workshop: Bamako, Results of the Community Based Monitoring were presented at this meeting.

January 2007: Ecotoxicological Training: 26 January - 10 February 2007, NGO particpants from Mali attended the PAN hosted Ecotoxicological Monitoring Training of Trainers (ToT) in Theis Senegal. From the meeting an ecotoxicological network was established, serving as a framework for skills and knowledge sharing.

January 2007: Community Based Monitoring: Following the Training of Trainers workshop in Senegal, August 2006, the Community Based Monitoring (CBM) was implemented in Mali, with initial focus on the development of tools for field monitoring, the training of 20 members of the communities of the project area Sikasso, and the collection of information about the pesticides problems in the communities. The results will be presented at the Multistakeholder Workshop in May 2007.

December 2006: Grant Agreement Signing: The Malian Minister of Economy and Finances, Mr. Abou Bakr Traore, and the representative of the World Bank in Mali, Mr. Alassane Diawara signed an agreement for financing the activities of the ASP in Mali, at an amount of 1.402.500.000 F CFA (soit 2.550.000 $ EU).

December 2006: Project Launch / Start-Up Mission: 18-20 December 2006, the World Bank project launch and FAO start-up workshop was held in Bamako, attended by PMU staff, government officials, local NGOs, local industry, and ASPIC partners. A 6-month action plan was developed.

October 2006: International expertise: Recruitment of an international expert to assist the Mali Project Management Unit (PMU) moving forward with finalising the inventory and moving into disposal.

May 2006: Negotiations completed: 31 May - 2 June 2006, Negotiations with the ASP Mali team in Bamako were successfully completed.

May 2006: Locust Stocks Workshop:

February 2006: Preparation Training: 27 February - 2 March 2006, Training, provided by the Technical Support Unit (TSU) to the ASP, was held in Rome and attended by representatives of the project team from Mali. The TSU, hosted by the FAO, provides direct technical support with a focus on project preparation and disposal. The TSU developed a series of new technical guidelines to assist P1 countries, such as Mali, in project preparation and implementation, with the aim that current internationally accepted best practice in key areas such as health and safety, disposal and project management are designed into all ASP country projects. Linked to this series of technical guidelines is the development of a centralised data base system for use by the country teams to log all obsolete pesticides and associated wastes found by inventory teams.

October 2005: National Inventory: Field staff training was initiated and work began on a national inventory of obsolete pesticide stocks and contaminated sites. Mali is a vast country and pesticide storage sites can be many thousands of kilometres apart. Nine regional teams were trained to operate in parallel. Once all the field data has been collected it will be entered into the Obsolete Pesticides Management System (OPMS) developed for ASP.

For more information on the Mali ASP, please contact:

• Project Coordination: Mr Lassina Traoré, Direction Nationale de l'Assainissement et des Contrôle des Pollutions et des Nuisance (DNACPN) telephone: (+223) 229 2410 
• NGO Activities: Mr Yacouba Diarra, Fondation pour le Développement au Sahel, telephone: (+223) 223 4108

Country Information 

Mali, officially the Republic of Mali, is the seventh largest country of Africa, bordering Algeria on the north, Niger on the east, Burkina Faso and the Côte d'Ivoire on the south, Guinea on the south-west, and Senegal and Mauritania on the west. Divided into 8 regions and 1 district, Mali has a total land area of 1,240,192 km² of which an estimated 65% is desert or semi-desert. French is the official language of Mail. With an estimated population of 13,518,000, 80% of the labour force is engaged in farming and fishing. Cotton is the countrys main export, with increasing interest in gold mining (2005 figures).