In order to indicate potential income-generating programs for women, 67 women in the river region and selected sites in the Assaba and the Guidimakha were interviewed in 1980 to illuminate effects of the 1970s-80s drought and male migration on Mauritanian women. Hypotheses were based on the drought causing unprecedented disruption to Mauritanian society, women (through male migration) either being abandoned or de-facto heads of households, and the desire of Mauritanian women (whose problems could be presented under one common rubric) for income-generating activities. The focus on income generation and current measures of women's status met obstacles in cultural definitions of work, wealth, and other economic indices. Ultimately the fundamental unit of analysis chosen was the household production unit (galle) and camp. Neither drought nor migration is new to Mauritanian society, and each production system has adapted, after its own fashion, to migration. While cultural and social customs inhibit Mauritanian women from advancing rapidly as income producers, a new household division of labor is forming, although women's control over the products of their labor is evolving more slowly. Findings are region-specific and should not be generalized to the whole population; interviews reported at the end of the document went through two stages of translation and should not always be accepted literally. (BRR)