CORRIDOR TO THE FUTURE?

But finding precious pasture is tricky when you "have no idea where to start" or when mayors do not allow you to pass through their villages, said Ould Taleb.

His organisation mapped strategic routes along Mauritania's southern border with Senegal, based on the location of water points, grazing areas and markets where pastoralists can sell their animals and produce.

It then lobbied local authorities to secure the routes and give pastoralists and their herds the right to pass through.

The initiative, led by French charity Acting for Life, is part of the Building Resilience and Adaptation to Climate Extremes and Disasters (BRACED) programme, funded by the UK Department for International Development (DFID).

"Pastoralism accounts for over 10 percent of the country's GDP," said Kane Aliou Hamadi, a GNAP project coordinator who manages the BRACED programme in Mauritania.

"Helping pastoralists get what they need is not just the right thing to do, it's smart."

Herder Ahmed Haibala said knowing where to find resources is critical, having spent three months roaming Mauritania's southern Gorgol region in search of water for his ailing goats and donkeys.

His 10-square-metre tent is as organised as it is busy, with metal teapots dangling from a black cauldron, bags of sugar and rice stacked up, straw mats rolled up in a corner.

"It's so I can pack up and leave easily," said Haibala, who has spent his life herding animals.

Every morning he sets off on a rented horse cart looking for boreholes and – when he is lucky – brings back several containers' worth of water to the campsite

"My 70 animals are too weak to move so I can neither go home (to neighbouring Brakna region) or travel to Senegal. I am stuck here," he said, chewing a bit of tobacco.

A few metres outside his tent lies the carcass of a calf, half buried in sand.

Livestock herding is an ancient activity in West Africa's Sahel, but herders have become increasingly vulnerable as climate change disrupts rain patterns in the region.

Erratic rainfall threatens the pastoralists' traditional months-long seasonal migration to Mali and Senegal – known as transhumance – and their main source of income, experts say.

"Transhumance allows pastoralists to hit three birds with one stone: find pastures and water, sell their animals at the market and buy produce they need like cereal crops and wood," Ould Taleb said.

But droughts have become so long they have forced some pastoralists to abandon their way of life entirely, he said.

"Many (pastoralists) had to abandon or sell their animals this year and move to slums near Nouakchott, taking up day jobs like road(side) sellers," said the head of the pastoralist association.

Giving up the herd is the worst thing that can happen to a pastoralist, Hamadi said. Livestock is so important for herders that community life revolves around the animals.

"Weddings, for example, will only happen in the rainy season, when animals are healthy and well fed," he explained.

"If the weather continues like this, pastoralism could disappear."

But more important than solving conflict is preventing it, said Hamadi - and that requires pastoralists having a safer and easier route to travel.

"To find resources, herders need to be able to freely cross borders (to Senegal and Mali) but local authorities rarely let them through," he said.

That is because farmers typically see pastoralists as thieves who steal food and destroy pastures, said Catherine Simonet, a research fellow at the Overseas Development Institute (ODI), a London-based think tank.

"As they are always on the move and don't necessarily own land they are hard to tax, so governments don't like them much either," she added.

Following successful experiences in Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, the BRACED project identified and negotiated with authorities several corridors in Mauritania's Trarza region for pastoralists to travel on their way to Senegal.

The routes - carefully chosen to avoid farming areas - opened in January and are about 50 km long, with white and red poles posted 200 metres apart to mark the path.

Now pastoralists "not only now know where to go, they do so at no cost and without crossing into farmers' fields", Hamadi said.

Habib Sidi, a cattle owner who also grows rice and vegetables in Trarza, said the markings have made driving his animals to grass much easier.

"Before I mostly guessed where I was going, and it was often too late to prevent my cows from stepping over a farmer's field," he said, bending to water a batch of yellowing cabbages.

"Now I just follow the signs, and farmers – myself included – are more relaxed because they feel their fields are protected."

So far the project has secured over 2,500 km of corridors across the Sahel, Hamadi said.

Herders are gaining recognition in Mauritania but one group remains largely overlooked: pastoralist women.

Transhumance remains predominantly a male activity, with women typically staying at home to manage harvests, any remaining animals and finances, said Aminetou Mint Maouloud, who set up the country's first association of women herders in 2014.

Women and children used to join men on their travels, according to local people, but as the trips with the herds got longer and riskier they were told to stay at home.

While that means more responsibilities for women in the village, it does not always translate into more power as far as men are concerned, Maouloud said at a meeting with a dozen pastoralist women in Nouakchott.

"For example, women are barely ever consulted on strategic matters such as what to do with the family herd or where to go looking for pastures," said Maouloud, sitting behind a large desk.

To change that, her association has elected a council of eight women from villages around the country to lobby the government on pastoralism issues.

But Maouloud said it would take time to change views.

Sidi, the cattle owner and farmer from Trarza, said he cannot imagine women joining him when he moves his herds.

"They don't understand animals," he said, shaking his head. "I'm not against them joining in principle, but not my wife."

Mouna Mokhtar, a pastoralist from R'Kiz whose husband and cattle have been gone for six months, said she feels ready to lead a herd herself.

"But I don't think (my husband) would let me because he negotiates better prices for our animals at the market," she explained, as she cut chunks of meat in a metal bowl.

Instead, she set up a vegetable cooperative in 2013 with 70 women from nearby villages. Now they pool their rice, onion and tomato harvests and sell them to wholesale buyers.

They share the profits – about 5,000 ouguiya ($14) per woman per month – and spend the surplus on drought-resistant seeds.

Although the women's husbands support the initiative, Mokhtar said, she is not counting too much on male support.

"It's great that they're encouraging us but what we need is money," she said, surrounded by a group of women. "If they really wanted our help, they would let us travel with them."