Southern Niger (south of 16 deg N) has experienced a strong increase in rainfall over the last two decades (averaging almost 10 mm or rainfall per year). Increases in RUE are restricted to southern Niger, dominated by dryland agriculture and rain-fed sandy soils, and rain-fed agriculture along seasonal watercourses (locally knows as fadama), and protected grazing zones (Milich and Weiss, 2000). In these ecological environments it seems that management has been able to capitalize on the increase in rainfall over the last 23 years. The regions with the highest increase in vegetation and Rain Use Efficiency are in the western part of Niger ( Tahoua and Maradi), the same regions were identified by Herrmann et al (2005) as strongly greening up, and they suggested that large natural resource management projects could have influenced the positive development. In the pastorally dominated northern parts the increases in rainfall is not reflected in vegetation growth, and hence the Rain Use Efficiency has dropped markedly. Click here for RUE trend map.