'Surrounded by an ocean of sand': Desertification pushes ancient city to the brink of oblivion

For centuries, poets, scholars and theologians have flocked to Chinguetti, a trans-Saharan trading post home to more than a dozen libraries containing thousands of manuscripts.

But it now stands on the brink of oblivion. Shifting sands have long covered the ancient city's 8th-century core and are encroaching on neighbourhoods at its current edge.

Residents say the desert is their destiny.

As the world's climate gets hotter and drier, sandstorms are more frequently depositing metres of dunes onto Chinguetti's streets and in people’s homes, submerging some entirely.

Tree-planting projects are trying to keep the invading sands at bay, but so far, they haven’t eased the deep-rooted worries about the future.

Chinguetti is one of four UNESCO World Heritage sites in Mauritania, a West African nation where only 0.5 per cent of land is considered farmable.

In Africa - the continent that contributes the least to fossil fuel emissions - only Somalia and Eswatini have experienced more climate change impacts, according to World Bank data.

Mauritanians believe Chinguetti is among Islam’s holiest cities. Its dry stone and mud mortar homes, mosques and libraries store some of West Africa’s oldest Quranic texts and manuscripts, covering topics ranging from law to mathematics.

Community leader Melainine Med El Wely feels agonised over the stakes for residents and the history contained within Chinguetti's walls. It's like watching a natural disaster in slow motion, he said.

“It’s a city surrounded by an ocean of sand that’s advancing every minute,” El Wely, the president of the local Association for Participatory Oasis Management, said.

“There are places that I walk now that I remember being the roofs of houses when I was a kid.”

He remembers