Sustainable Urban Development in Nouakchott
Nouakchott, the capital city of Mauritania, faces major urban challenges: uncontrolled sprawl, climate vulnerability, waste management issues, precarious mobility, and pressure on natural resources. To address these issues, the African Development Bank (AfDB) and the Urban and Municipal Development Fund (UMDF) launched the African Cities Program (ACP), aiming to transform African cities into resilient, sustainable, and inclusive development hubs.
Following Conakry, Libreville, Bangui, and Kisumu, Nouakchott is the fifth city on the continent for which our consortium—Groupe Huit-Phoenix—has been invited to develop an urban action plan, structured around a shared vision, strategic objectives, and a shortlist of priority actions.
These processes rely on participatory approaches involving all urban stakeholders.
For Nouakchott, an innovative approach was adopted using a “serious game” inspired by the “African Cities Fresk” (*Fresque des Villes Africaines*), developed by Groupe Huit in collaboration with AFD and ADEME, based on the “Climate Fresk” model.
The goal was to unite city stakeholders around a shared diagnosis, map urban and human-induced pressures, visualize interconnections between challenges, and identify priority levers for action. Ultimately, the aim was to co-construct concrete solutions for the city’s Urban Action Plan.
The next step involves refining the project sheets resulting from the workshops prior to political validation, moving from planning to action.
The use of visual and interactive tools made complex concepts tangible and fostered dialogue among stakeholders who typically operate in silos.
This approach democratized the conversation, enabling everyone to contribute actively, and produced concrete deliverables that can be directly utilized for the next stages of the process.
The Nouakchott experience demonstrates that “serious games”—combining visual pedagogy, inclusive participation, and methodical structuring—can be successfully adapted to the challenges of urban development in Africa to generate actionable proposals.
