I was curious enough to look at this story a bit more. Some related, interesting tidbits: In 2004, Niger estimated 50% of farmland was using the farmer managed natural regeneration framework (FMNR) described in the article, essentially reforestation through growing new trees from sprouts on old tree stumps [1]. An update in 2022 says over 200 million trees have been added via FMNR [2].
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farmer-managed_natural_regener...
[2] https://theworld.org/media/2022-04-29/niger-s-unexpected-suc...