Cape Verde is a set of ten small volcanic islands, in major part mountainous, situated in the Atlantic Ocean, without natural resources, with a dry climate characterized by lack and irregularity of precipitations, the natural conditions are hostile to human implantation. During their discovery, the islands were desert and the vegetation limited with around 300 species. In the beginning of the XVIth century, it was an obligatory stop on the routes to America, to the African coast to Asia. They perform a role of enter port for slaves traffic and point of acclimatization of American plants before their diffusion in Africa and vice versa. The development of agriculture (mostly the rainy corn and beans) caused the disappearance of a large part of the natural vegetation and degradation of the environment. The hungers during the dryness eliminated regularly large part of the population, forcing many habitants to emigrate. After independency, important anti-erosive and reforestation works are realized in order to protect aquifers, many dams are built and more efficient irrigation methods are developed; the human consume relies more and more on desalinized water; the irrigated agriculture strongly increases meanwhile corn decreases and the development of tourism brings an increased interest for the protection of environment.