With its island-building binge, Dubai is a big customer for African sand. So are Africa's expanding concrete manufacturing giants. For the island project "The Palm Jumeirah," Dubai used 200 million cubic meters of sand and stone. Some of the sand came from the sea off Dubai's coast but a large amount came from African beaches. In Cape Verde, one in three people is unemployed. Sand mining is a fast way to earn money. The consequences of excessive sand mining are devastating. On beaches where tortoises once buried their eggs, there is now only dirt and stones.