Due to its dependence on fluctuating rainfall, the animals lack pastureland. From 2009 to 2010, the circle of Ménaka only recorded a few rainfall events, which prevented it from regenerating pastureland. The result was a considerable lack of cattle feed. Consequently, many livestock farmers transhumed towards neighbouring Niger. Those who remain are always lacking in feed. The population no longer has pure milk, even for family consumption.

Due to a good rainy season in 2010, upon the return of transhumance, most of the animals perished en route. Livestock farmers like Mr Assalim, 52 years old, father of eight children, finds it hard to feed himself and his family. Mr Assalim: “I left in transhumance with several hundred heads of animals, mostly cattle. Upon return from transhumance, all the animals died, exhausted from hunger. Today, only nine sheep and two donkeys remain. All around me, there are a dozen families living in the same conditions, not knowing what to do. We must get by somehow. What I do to survive, together with my family, is to collect wild fonio, which has now become our staple food. We often work for others.”

Usually, the nomads of Ménaka do not sell their milk. They limit themselves to own consumption - most of them preferring to leave the calves suckling their mothers- perhaps not knowing the benefits that could be derived from selling milk. Indeed, milk production and sale could be an alternative to the development of cattle farming in Ménaka. Today, the livestock farmer cooperatives created around Ménaka try to produce milk from selected Azawakh Zebus. Unfortunately, they are faced with the problem of livestock feed. The defective conditions of the Ansongo-Ménaka laterite road, 205 km long, discourage a good number of transporters to take this route. One of the responses of the populations and their partners in the milk problem in Ménaka was the creation of two mini-dairies. With a very reduced capacity, they not only lack electricity to conserve production, but they also lack the means of transportation to collect milk from the livestock farmers in periods of abundance. Ménaka could be a possible exporter of milk, but at  the moment, it consumes more milk powder than it imports.

This imported milk is essentially the raw material processed by the two mini-dairies where they produce curdled milk, yogurt and fresh pasteurized milk. It is clear that this issue must be addressed. There is new hope on the horizon for re-launching milk production in Ménaka - the FSCA Programme in Mali. Indeed, the population highly depends on this project in order to teach livestock farmers to produce fodder and improve urea-treated straw. This will finally enable them to produce cow milk in a new dairy where electricity, no longer a luxury, will allow them to conserve their milk products.