Perspectives On Pastoralism at the Global Landscape Forum conference

On Wednesday 2 and Thursday 3 June, our ‘Perspectives on Pastoralism’ film festival was part of the Global Landscape Forum conference on dry land restoration in Africa, just a few days before the start of the UN decade dedicated to ecosystem restoration. Our selection of films offered the audiences the opportunity to learn more about pastoralists and the impressive and biodiverse drylands they know to manage sustainably providing them in their livelihoods. Our film festival took place across 4 sessions of the conference.

Session 1: Mining threats in pastoralist areas

This first session featured the film ‘UnderMining Uganda’, which shows the negative impacts upon pastoralists in the Karamoja region 20 years since the start of industrial mining. This film explores the reasons why the industry is far from contributing to socioeconomic gains in this largely pastoral region. Worse, it is contributing to massive land grabs that are undermining the livelihoods of pastoralists and other inhabitants of the area.

To contextualize the film, Loupa Pius from DADO – the Dynamic Agro-pastoralist Development Organization (DADO) Kaabong – shared his experiences and insights and answered audience questions.

Re-watch the first session here.

Session 2: Pastoralist livelihoods in Africa

This second session focused on pastoralist livelihoods in Africa through two films made in Niger. The first is the documentary, ‘Waynaabe: Life scenes of the Wodaabe’, which shows the life of nomadic Wodaabe livestock keepers through the eyes of the young mother Mooro. Her unmarried niece, Mariama, explains the worso, a ceremonial gathering of their clan in Akadaney. The second film, ‘Ngaynaaka: Herding chaos’, focuses on how pastoralists thrive on nature’s variability. As the environment becomes more unpredictable, people all over the world face higher costs in an effort to sustain the usual strategies aimed at controlling it. The Wodaabe pastoralists show that there is another way.

Dr. Saverio Krätli, an honorary editor of the journal Nomadic Peoples, is an anthropologist specializing in pastoral systems. Saverio has worked extensively across sub-Saharan Africa. Among his many publications, he wrote the Pastoral Development Orientation Framework in 2019. Saverio shared insights from his experience working on ‘Ngaynaaka: Herding chaos’, and answered audience questions.

Re-watch the second session here.

Session 3: Speaking truth to power: pastoralists’ advocacy

This third session confronts political and economic injustices with the theme, ‘Speaking truth to power: pastoralists’ advocacy’.

Land grabbing in pastoralist areas is unmasked through two films in this session. The first film is ‘Olosho’, a participatory video (PV) made by 6 community members in Loliondo from 5 Maasai clans in northern Tanzania, who have been denied access to vital pasture and waterpoints for their herd and suffered mass eviction from their villages within the disputed land. The second film, ‘Lower Omo: local tribes under threat’, is an advocacy film that reveals the situation of agropastoralists in the Lower Omo Valley in Southern Ethiopia, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Nick Lunch, from Insight Share in the UK shared his experience with participatory video and the making of Olosho. Thereafter, the themes presented were elaborated further by Dr. Christina (Echi) Gabbert from the Institute for Social and Cultural Anthropology at Göttingen University, Germany, who also answered questions from the audience. She has collaborated in southern Ethiopia with pastoralists over the last twenty years.

Rewatch the third session here.

Session 4: Global recognition of pastoralism and its future

The final session focused on global recognition of pastoralism and its future with films from Uganda, India and Ireland. A first film, ‘The Turkana’ shed light on the life of the Turkana pastoralists of northern Uganda facing climate change. The second film, ‘Stories from the landscape: cattle drove’ shows the living cultural heritage of transhumance in Europe: moving livestock to different grazing grounds in a seasonal cycle that goes back as long as people have been farming in the region. Offering a South Asian perspective on pastoralism, ‘Preserving Rajasthan’s camel herds’, shows how the Raika people in India have been herding camels in Rajasthan for centuries. However, their traditional way of life is now under threat. The final film, ‘Bayandalai: Lord of the Taiga’, leaves us with a question about the future. From inside his yurt in northern Mongolia, the reindeer herder Bayandalai ‒ an elder of the Dukhas tribe ‒ muses about the significance of life and death in the largest forest on Earth, the Taiga. Through his connection with the reindeer and with the Taiga, Bayandalai has access to spiritual and practical knowledge that he may not be able to pass on to his family members before the lures of city life — jobs, money, houses, things — entice them away.

Dr. Ann Waters-Bayer of the Agrecol Association, Dr. Margareta Lelea of the German Institute for Tropical and Subtropical Agriculture, and Loupa Pius from DADO – the Dynamic Agro-pastoralist Development Organization (DADO) Kaabong – offered closing remarks and answered final questions.

Rewatch the final session here.