An end of year reflection : what can we learn from pastoralists?

It has been a very busy end of the year, and i am just noticing that my blog remained silent for two moths and many of the interesting learning will only appear in 2018. But as the end of the the year approaches, it is time to reflect about 2017 first. It was a year that took me to Burkina Faso and Ethiopia twice for the CLEANED project that aims to assess environmental trade-off of intensifying livestock value chains in developing countries, to Somaliland where i have been setting up a GIS lab and working with the local government on the livestock sector, and to Northern Kenya.

So what did 2017 bring? for me it was the year where I engaged with pastoralists across Africa, in Burkina Faso, Somaliland and Kenya and discovered a fascinating world, where all the logic I know about was challenged.

Pastoralists have a very different way to see the world than the smallholders farmers I usually work with. And it might sound stupid, but because pastoralists are moving with their animals in very harsh environment, they are not really interested in accumulating "stuff" that is heavy to carry around and they are used to live with almost nothing. This is why many of the incentives that we usually use, such as money or in kind just do not work.

Pastoralists value their community and their animals. Therefore, working on the relationship with these communities and build up trust is the better incentive than some materialist item. Also, I have discovered that pastoralists have their own information sharing mechanism that they have developed and improved over centuries and nobody is waiting for any phone app to bring a revolution, they have the information they need. Also information is shared within relevant networks within clans, and there are good reasons why that information is not public : governments do not know how many pastoralists are crossing boarders (a concept that is nonexistent to many pastoralists) and therefore cannot tax animals going from one country to the next, others clans who might compete on ressource might not yet know where the good pastures are. So bringing digital products to this world might do more harm than good, and a better understanding of what information can be shared with whom is necessary before thinking of digital products.

Across all countries, pastoralism is under pressure. There is often conflict on land among pastoralist clans themselves, as in many places the number of livestock is above the carrying capacity of the land which has led to serious land degradation and a resulting lack of available feed and fodder. Also there are conflicts between pastoralist and crop farmers, on who has the right to use the land. Pastoralism is often seen as an old-fashioned lifestyle that is doomed. But especially, in Western Africa there is a strong movement to fight for the right for such a traditional lifestyle.

Meeting pastoralists and working with anthropologists this year have changed the way i look at agricultural intensification in Sub-Saharan Africa. Clearly, there is an urgent need to increase food production in Africa where population will double over the next 30 years. High potential area, where rain is abundant and soils are fertile, will have to play a big role in producing more food, also smallholder farmers in those area are keen intensifying there production that they believe will bring more income. But, in dry low potential areas it is less clear what intensification of production can bring, and people making use of these area have a right to choose their lifestyle, even if it goes against the mainstream thinking. Who are we to push pastoralists towards something they do not believe in for the sake of feeding the world?

Clearly, in the transition zone, between the high potential area and dry rangeland, conflict between the two world emerges. In those zones, land use planning and clear rules that regulate fair access to land and its biomass need to be implemented so that both pastoralists and non-pastoralist can co-habitate. Combined with efforts of land rehabilitation, and emerging opportunities outside of the agricultural sector that can offer jobs to those who do not want to remain a pastoralist, might support a productive and sustainable  traditional pastoral production that sustains a decent livelihood for those who choose to live in this way.

As we move to 2018, let's keep an open mind to those who go through life differently and learn to appreciate what they can teach us, the same way pastoralists have reshaped my understanding of agricultural intensification this year. I remain with thanking you for following this blog, that in the meanwhile has up to 2500 clicks a month, and wish you a happy new year!

Note that all pictures in this post are taken from here. They are made Gille Coulon, an award winning photographer. He has exhibited these pictures at the "centre culturel francais" in Ouagadougou, an exhibition that was lucky to see during one of my many visits in Burkina Faso.

Identifying dynamics of natural resources in Somaliland through participatory mapping

If i tell you Somaliland, what is your first thought? War? terrorists? Al-Shebab? But in reality Somaliland is all but this. It is a place, which GDP depends for more than 80% on livestock production, exiting for a livestock scientist. It is a young democracy of an country that has not been recognized by the international community, yet has its own currency, own visa procedure and own government. Much of the international aid focuses on emergency relief and food aid. Little money flows for development, but some does, for example with FAO-SWALIM, who create a lot of good maps.

Hargeisa livestock market

Also Terra Nuova is one of the NGOs that does development work, and works mainly in the livestock sector. ILRI was contracted by Terra Nuova to implement the research component of one of their livestock project. Next to collecting analyzing data and create documentation for a country that has lost it all in a war, we also build capacity of ISTVS the vet school in Sheik. 

This week, i have hosted a participatory mapping workshop with decision maker to discuss the current state of natural resource that are needed to support the livestock sector. Participatory mapping asks participants to map, i.e. tell us where a given natural resource is and tell us more about that resource, for example the current state of the resource, who the user is, if there are conflicts and if people somehow are changing behavior. 

This allows to identify dynamics that define changes of natural resource, so that we can predict changes that might occur in future and support policy maker to take actions now that could address future issues.  

In a first step we have asked participants to rank the resource needed for the livestock sector. All three groups came up with the following order : 1. land, 2.water, 3. livestock feed. Number four was different from the groups, some would say livestock, other soil.

Want to know more about what we learned from the workshop? We are still processing the reports! So keep posted! 

Rehabilitating land to decrease conflict with pastorlists

During my last year trip to Burkina Faso, I visited a community in Thiou, North West of Ouahigouya.



I was welcomed by Sa Majeste, the head of the community for a courtesy visit and present the Livestock and Fish Research program I am working on. He is also involved with the the "Association pour la Promotion de l'Elevage au Sahel et en Savane (APESS)" a very active organization around the support of smallholder livestock keepers. 

The head of the community and some representative of the community

Like many other communities around, they are cropping on some lands. When the dry season comes and fodder for livestock becomes short, they go on transhumances. Some men in each family will take their cattle South in the search for fodder. They take small ruminants (goats and sheep) with them, to sell on the way and get money meet their daily needs.
 
It is a very innovative community that has been testing different fodder for their cattle, trying on the one hand to reduce their own need to go on transhumance and on the other hand to make sure that other pastoralists coming from the North passing their land find sufficient fodder, so that no conflict emerges on on cropped land.

Testing various fodder crops including soya

On their communal land (basically owned by the head of the community), the community tries to rehabilitated degraded land. This land was quite unproductive but with smart rainwater management, biomass is now growing and can be used as fodder.

The result of rainwater management, grasses are starting to grow in areas

The community envisions that when the grass will grow plenty, then they will perceive a fee from any pastoralist who wants to stay and use the area to feed his animals. This fee will allow to cover the costs of rehabilitating the land. The area will also insure drinking points.

In order to avoid the spreading of animal diseases, there is also a vaccination park, where animals can get vaccinated efficiently.

vaccination park

The area around Thiou should become one of the zones where pastoralists are welcome within fixed boundaries and will find sufficient fodder and water along the Mali-Ghana transhumance route. In this way, conflict between pastoralist and cropping communities can be reduced.

I was impressed to discover this area and its people who believe in a peaceful pastoralism that benefits smallholders.

benefit sharing mechanisms : a Kenyan success story

Benefit sharing mechanisms is becoming a more and more important topic both in science and in political discourses. Benefit sharing mechanisms are used to "set the incentives right". This is when one agent does not have a personal interest is doing something or not doing something though it would actually contribute to a social benefit (benefit to others). Payment for ecosystem services is one way to implement benefit sharing mechanisms.
Whereas in the developed world, payment for ecosystems services are usually enforced by the government (an example of payment for environmental services are the voluntary agri- enviroental schemes), examples in the developing world are still rare.
Last week on Aljazeera I came across one amazing example in Kenya, where benefits from tourism is shared with pastoralists. A fund to which tourists contribute is made to pay pastoralist to not give there land for tourism activities and make sure that sufficient open space is maintained for wildlife. It is good example from Kenya on how one can share benefits and give pastoralists a secured income for preserving their land :

Land tenure conflicts in Kenya

On my last day in Nairobi, I just came across this Al Jazeera video on Kenyan pastoralists. It reminded me that despite of Kenya being so much more developed than Ethiopia (Nairobi really feels like the New York of Africa), in drought prone areas the issues are similar.

I guess the story of this Kenyan pastoralist should remind us, that the economic concepts that we usually apply on crop land in the wet tropics (and corresponds to the mainstream economic theory) should not be transferred to the pastoral zone (see post on economics of droughts,http://catherinepfeifer.blogspot.com/2011/10/some-good-explanations-on-economics-of.html).
In the Blue Nile basin, land certification, that is giving the (individual) ownership of the land for 20-99 years to a farmer,, resulted in having more farmers starting to invest into soil and water conservation infrastructure (terrace, bund) and planting trees. As a result watersheds are better managed and agricultural productivity increases.
This video shows that transferring this logic to pastoralist zone where land that has traditionally be managed collectively mainly leads to conflicts. Despite of this, I still believe that land in pastoralist zone should be certified quickly at least for the Ethiopian case, where "land grabbers" are queuing for getting the land (http://catherinepfeifer.blogspot.com/2011/07/rights-of-ethiopian-pastoralists.html).
I think there is scope for developing a land tenure system that garantees to pastoralists the access to their land, but does not hamper them to mange it in their traditional way.