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 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.
Programme
