Lower Omo: local tribes under threat

This advocacy film by the Oakland Institute (USA) reveals the situation of agropastoralists in the Lower Omo Valley in Southern Ethiopia, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It is home to about 200,000 people from several ethnic groups, e.g. Bode, Dassenach, Hamer, Karo, Kwegu, Mursi, Nyangatom and Suri. Most of them raise livestock where the Omo River’s annual flooding replenishes grazing areas and practise flood-retreat cropping on the floodplains. Their cattle are a source of food, wealth and pride, and are intimately tied to their cultural identity. Their lives and culture are threatened by the construction of the Gibe III Dam.