Stability and livelihood challenges in the Sikasso border region
This series of reports was originally published by XCEPT.
This chapter focuses on cross-border trade dynamics in the Sikasso border region, both licit and illicit, and the adaptation of communities to the presence of security forces in these border areas. It also explores the presence and activities of armed groups from different backgrounds and ideologies operating between Mali and Burkina Faso, as well as the role of trade in the lives of communities on both sides of the border. The chapter reviews the formal and informal trade and movement of people between Mali’s Sikasso Province and the Hauts-Bassins and Cascades regions in southwestern Burkina Faso, now the region of Guriko following the country's administrative restructuring in July 2025. These regions, which also trade extensively with parts of northern Côte d’Ivoire, are among the most economically important for Mali and Burkina Faso.
This is a crucial area for commerce and the movement of people and goods. As one young male merchant from Sikasso, Mali, described: “These commercial centres are linked to the communities (in Mali and Burkina Faso) by trade, buying, and selling of commercial products. These commercial products benefit the two peoples. These commercial centres allow us to maintain our social cohesion.” For several years, the area has also been an area of expansion for violent extremist organisations (VEOs), particularly the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wa al-Muslimin (JNIM) and its predecessors. There are significant security concerns in the region as movement and insecurity shift further south in Mali and Burkina Faso, and as violent extremist groups continue to impact the Central Sahel and Coastal West African states.
The area is a hub for cross-border trade in various goods, including clothing and fabric, shoes, fuel, tubers, vegetables and legumes, groundnuts, shea butter, cattle, and dried caterpillars. The Sikasso border region is also a major site for transhumance movement,4 both historically and more recently due to climate change and displacement from conflict in central and northern Mali and Burkina Faso.
