Travel Guide Lac De Kossou

This artificial lake, 150 km long, was formed to build the Kossou dam between 1969 and 1978 on Baule land, not far from Yamoussoukro, under the Houphouët era. It allowed the irrigation of 50,000 hectares of land, but it also cost the displacement of nearly 100,000 inhabitants by covering 1,700 km² of land, including 200,000 hectares of forest, savannahs, plantations (including 20,000 hectares of coffee and cocoa plants) and villages, i.e. three times the size of Lake Geneva! Félix Houphouët-Boigny is said to have entrusted the management of the Bandama Valley Authority (AVB) to his cousin Aoussou Koffi, explaining that the major problem that arose was the discontent caused by the immersion of the graves of the ancestors of the Baoule villagers: "I understood them (...) but I told them that Queen Pokou had to sacrifice her only child in the waters of the Comoé River in order to obtain the passage of the Baoule. And I told them that today they were asked to sacrifice the tomb of their forefathers. They withdrew and on returning said: "We will not do less than the Queen". Two hundred villages were thus submerged and the AVB was dissolved in 1980, without having been able to complete its redevelopment and conversion tasks. Of the 100,000 "déguerpis" of Kossou, nearly 3,600 former peasants have become fishermen. Their production amounts to 20,000 tons. However, many have given up fishing to devote themselves to coffee and cocoa plantations thanks to the possibility of irrigation. If you pass through the village of Kossou, don't miss the Ecoya pilot cooperative, the result of a project initiated by the members of the "Instant Chocolate team". The objective is to transform 10% of the harvest of cocoa farmers organized in a cooperative into consumer chocolate, and to improve the living conditions of the population, especially women, who are vulnerable in rural areas.