The Ivory Coast has an area of 322,000 km² and a population of 12 million. In 1990 the GNP amounted to around 750 US$ per capita which means that the Ivory Coast belongs to the lower category of countries with average income. The project area comprises the region of Korhogo in the north of the country and shows all the features of a country with a low income. It is a bush savanna region with linear forests seaming watercourses. It comprises the so-called "zone dense" and the "zone transistaire".
The "zone dense" extends to the south and to the southeast of Korhogo. The area is relatively densely populated and has experienced increasing deforestation since the end of the 19th century as a result of the clearing of areas for arable farming and to obtain wood. The linear forests and trees have been extensively replaced by a grass savanna loosely interspersed with fruit and other useful trees (baobab, néré, karité, mango, cashew etc.) distributed over the agriculturally used and over unused land. The relatively intensive agriculture with only short fallow periods has resulted in increasing lateritic property of the soil.
The "zone transitaire" extends along the border to the "zone dense" and is a transition between intensively used land and the scrub and tree savanna. It extends over the north and northeast of the region.
The climate is tropical with a distinct rainy season. The average precipitation amounts to about 1,500 mm in Korhogo. The annual precipitation fluctuated in the period 1975 to 1984 by between 835 and 1557 mm. The rainy season from April to October is the time of intensive agricultural activity. There is an arid period of 3 months with dry and cool winds from the north. During this period there are great differences in day/night temperatures.
The whole of the north is marked by cultural and lingual homogeneity of the Sénoufo to a great extent. In addition to this, the project area is inhabited by the Malinké, generally called Dioula, who originally immigrated from the north and who are Moslems (the Sénoufo mostly belong to their traditional natural religion). The Dioula are mainly concerned with trading, the processing of foodstuffs and itinerant trading. The third ethnic group is the Peulh, who are nomadic herdsmen and came here mainly after the great drought in 1974 from the Sahel. They live in mixed settlements with the established arable farmers and are still partly transhumant. On the whole, there are great differences in the density of the settlements which reaches 80 inhabitants per km² in the "zone dense".
The traditional system practised by the Sénoufo is arable farming which secures their subsistence. After having concentrated exclusively on the provision of foodstuffs, nowadays more and more crops which can be marketed and turned into monetary income are being cultivated (e.g. cotton). Livestock farming is more understood as a way of accumulating surpluses from arable farming and constitutes the traditional bank, since when this is necessary (burials, weddings, starting school etc.) it can be quickly accessed.
The Peulh mainly base their production on livestock and animal husbandry. Arable farming is only of a subordinate role for them. The rapid growth of the Peulh herds has lead to increased damage to the crops of the Sénoufo and to tension related to this. For this reason livestock husbandry is considered by many of the Sénoufo to be a destabilising factor for arable farming.