Global goals, local actions: A framework for integrating indigenous knowledge and ecological methods for rangeland assessment and monitoring in northern Kenya
Hassan G. Roba
Doctoral Thesis
Department of International Environment and Development Studies, Noragric Norwegian University of Life Sciences (UMB)
Ås, June 2008
Thesis no.: 2008:25 ISBN: 978-82-575-0828-9 ISSN: 1503-1667
To Halima and Dirram
Table of Contents
List of Acronyms iv
List of Figures v
List of Papers vi
Acknowledgement vii
Abstract viii
1. Introduction 1
1.1 Background to the study 2
1.2. Organization of the thesis 6
1.3. Study sites 7
2. Integration of global goals and local actions 11
2.1. Definition of terms and concepts 14
3. Theoretical perspectives 19
4. Methodological perspectives 23
5. Framework for integrating local knowledge in the implementation of GECs 27
5.1 Indigenous knowledge 28
5.2 Ecological methods 30
5.3 The selection of indicators 32
6. The implementation mechanisms of the framework 34
6.1. Step I: Interviews 34
6.2. Step II: Joint field assessments 35
6.3. Step III: The workshop 37
7. Results and discussions 37
7.1. Impact of pastoral sedentarization on vegetation 37 7.2. Herder landscape classification, vegetation assessment and monitoring 40
7.3. Herders’ perceptions of land degradation 41
7.4 Long term environmental dynamics 43
8. Implications for the global goals 45
9. Conclusions and recommendations 46
References 48
Part B 60
List of Acronyms
CBD Convention on Biological Diversity CBO Community Based Organizations
CCD Convention on Combating Desertification EMC Environmental Management Committees GEC Global Environmental Conventions GLM General Linear Model
IEK Indigenous Ecological Knowledge IPAL Integrated Project on Arid Lands ITK Indigenous Technical Knowledge LGP Landscape Grazing Potential LGS Landscape Grazing Suitability NAPs National Action Program
NEMA National Environmental Management Authority NGOs Non Governmental Organizations
PCA Principal Components Analysis PRA Participatory Rural Appraisal RRA Rapid Rural Appraisal SAS Statistical Analysis System
SEEM Socio-Economic and Ecological Model SPSS Statistical Package for the Social Sciences TEK Traditional Ecological Knowledge
UNCCD United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification
UNCED United Nations Conference on Environment and Development UNCOD United Nations Conference on Desertification
UNEP Unite Nations Environmental Programme
List of Figures
Figure 1. Location of study sites on a map of the Marsabit District 8
Figure 2a. Annual rainfall for Marsabit town 9
Figure 2b. Mean monthly rainfall for Marsabit town between 1935 and 2004 9 Figure 2c. Total annual rainfall for the Kargi station 10 Figure 3. Framework for the implementation of Global Environmental Conventions, showing integration of
indigenous knowledge and ecological methods for the assessment and monitoring of environmental change 28 Figure 4. Framework for integrating herder knowledge and ecological methods for assessing and monitoring
rangelands in northern Kenya 35
List of Papers
Paper I.
Roba, H.G. and Oba, G. 2008. Integration of herder knowledge and ecological methods for land degradation assessment around sedentary settlements in a sub-humid zone in northern Kenya.
International Journal of Sustainable Development & World Ecology 15 (2008) 251–264 DOI 10.3843/SusDev.15.3:8
Paper II
Roba, H. G and Oba, G. 2008. Community participatory landscape classification and biodiversity assessment and monitoring of grazing lands in northern Kenya.
Journal of Environmental Management (In press). doi:10.1016/j.jenvman.2007.12.017
Paper III
Roba, H. G. and Oba, G. Efficacy of integrating herder knowledge and ecological methods for monitoring rangeland degradation in Northern Kenya (Submitted to Human Ecology)
Paper IV
Roba, H. G. and Oba, G. “Pulling away the Last Tree” or Reversing Desertification? Re-assessments of land cover changes around pastoral settlements in Northern Kenya (Revised, Global Environmental Change)
Acknowledgement
The successful completion of this thesis is as a result of enormous support and encouragement I received from many people. I sincerely thank my supervisor Professor Gufu Oba for tirelessly supervising my work from the initial stage of developing research proposal, to the fieldwork and finally, the write up of this thesis. I benefited a lot from his guidance and scholarly skills for conducting research. During the fieldwork, I received valuable support from experienced field technicians of Kenya Agricultural Research Institutes (KARI) in Marsabit, namely, Hussein Wallaga, Peter Geykuku, and Diiba Guyo. I also thank Mr. Jacob Kimani of the Department of Resource Survey and Remote Sensing (DRSRS) of Kenya for his support in the interpretation of satellite imagery.
I am grateful to the staff and colleagues at the Noragric Department for providing a pleasant and academically stimulating environment. Many thanks to the Librarians Liv Ellingsen and Ingeborg Brandtzæg for being very helpful in availing relevant literature whenever I needed them throughout my study period. I acknowledge administrative and IT assistance I got from Josie Teurling, Frode Sundnes, Aslaug Gotehus, Lars Øimoen, Ann Marte, Anders Dysvik and Joanna Boddens-Hosang.
I thank my colleagues Boku Tache, Zeinabu Khalif and Mohamed Guyo who accorded me a highly valued company and useful discussions related to my work. I also thank my other colleagues, Hussein Tadicha, Wario Tadicha, Bule Hallo, Safo Roba, Tari Doti, Philip Ebei, Steve Lesoron, Hussein Jemma, Charllote Nakakaawa, Ayele Tessema, Bed Mani Dahal, David Mwesigye Tumusiime for their encouragements. I thank Ali Ibrahim and Adan M. Boru for taking care of my family in my absence.
I am grateful the Norwegian Research Council who funded the study through the project no.
16139/S30 and to the National Museums of Kenya and in particular the Director Dr. Idle Farah for giving me paid leave to pursue Phd program.
My special gratitude is due to the Ariaal and Rendille herders of Marsabit who accepted me as their friend and sacrificed their time to participate in the joint field work and for their willingness to share with me their knowledge on the environment.
Finally my heartfelt gratitude goes to my wife Halima Ibrahim, for enduring the loneliness and also for taking care of our daughter Dirram while I was away. Her love and support provided a source of my inspiration.
Abstract
This thesis is about testing a methodological framework for integrating indigenous knowledge and ecological methods for promoting local communities’ participation in the implementation of Global Environmental Conventions (GECs) such as the Convention on Combating Desertification (CCD) and the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) at local community levels. The thesis (divided into Part A and Part B) tackles the integration of indigenous knowledge and ecological methods for assessing and monitoring human impacts on the environments of northern Kenya around sedentarized settlements that was associated with land degradation and desertification as well as the loss of biodiversity. Development of the framework is based on in-depth analysis of theoretical and methodological analysis of environmental indicator selection. The implementation of the framework is approached at three levels: the global level related to the articles of the GECs, the national level concerned with the prioritizing of the action programs and finally, the local community levels where the actions of implementations of the conventions take place. In implementing the framework, the thesis focused on the third part which involved local communities in participatory research.
Implementation at the local level involves the consideration of a diversity of ecological, production and social-cultural factors, and the use of local knowledge for resource assessment and monitoring.
The implementation of the framework was conducted in Marsabit District, Northern Kenya, in two contrasting environments where two pastoral communities were used as partners. In the sub-humid (Ariaal) zone, the study sites were represented by the Karare and Lkijiji settlements. This zone included a National Forest Reserve and Game Reserve that is protected from livestock grazing, which served as a benchmark for monitoring vegetation change. The arid lowlands (Rendille), were represented by the Kargi and Korr settlements. In order to implement the framework the research was aimed at (a) understanding herder knowledge and ecological methods for assessing and monitoring the impact of pastoral sedentarization on land degradation; (b) applying herders’
knowledge of landscape classification by asking participatory questions for monitoring changes in biodiversity; (c) using herder and ecological indicators for assessing and monitoring land degradation; and (d) understanding long-term changes in vegetation cover using herder monitoring and ecological monitoring methods.
For addressing the goals in implementing the framework, herders’ knowledge and ecological methods were integrated in three sequential steps. Semi-structured interviews and group discussions
with key informants were used to generate information on livestock management, changes in vegetation indicators and historical changes in land use patterns. Joint transect walks were conducted with knowledgeable herders to assess environmental change using ecological indicators (vegetation and soil) and herder anthropogenic indicators (i.e. landscape grazing potential and landscape grazing suitability). Monitoring of marked transects, satellite images taken at different times, and herders’
knowledge were used to evaluate long-term changes in vegetation cover around permanent settlements in the arid lowlands that were previously mapped as desertified sites. Finally, a workshop was organized with herders and Environmental Management Committees (EMCs) in which they participated in informal discussions on issues addressed by the joint research project.
The analyses showed that the rangelands both the sub-humid (Ariaal) and the arid lowlands (Rendille) had shrunk during the previous three to four decades. Mobility had however remained as the main strategies for land use for grazing through splitting of the herds between the mobile (fora) managed in the remote rangelands, and home-based rangelands. Although it had been earlier hypothesized that pastoral sedentarization contributed to degradation of vegetation around settlements, the present research found no evidence of permanent degradation. In the sub-humid zone an increase in bush cover, a decline in herbaceous species, or an increase in unpalatable as opposed to palatable plant species was found according to herder assessments. For making comparisons, the herders separated the biodiversity into those species that are desirable for livestock grazing and those that are undesirable. For the herders, the qualitative changes in vegetation indicators were associated with continuous grazing, banning the use of fire for range management, and episodic rainfall.
Ecologists on the other hand, considered the total species pool, which showed no variability across land use gradients from the settlements compared to the benchmark.
In the arid lowlands, vegetation recovery around the Kargi and Korr settlements was observed.
Around the Korr settlement that was mapped some 25 years ago as being desertified, key fodder species now dominate the areas around the settlement, which also has higher herbaceous and shrub cover. In these arid lowlands herders have been actively involved in environmental management.
The home herds are located in pastoral camps outside the settlements, and due to protection, the rangelands within a 4 km radius of the settlements show recovery of both herbaceous and woody vegetation. Monitoring of the communal grazing areas did not show significant variations in species composition over the 24 year period, although the herders reported changes in land use patterns from seasonal to year round grazing. The changes in species composition were confirmed by ecological
methods, which linked the changes to seasonal variability, as opposed to permanent loss in species composition. Around the permanent settlements of Kargi and Korr, satellite imagery showed an increase in vegetation cover between1986 and 2000. The evidence shows that conservation methods practiced by local communities have reversed land degradation reported earlier in the 1970s. The evidence further shows that the arid ecosystems of northern Kenya exhibited resilience with a capacity for recovery, when appropriate management measures were taken. The research found no evidence of permanent degradation leading to desertification. Herders monitored land degradation using multiple indicators including livestock productivity, landscape grazing potential, landscape grazing suitability and changes in vegetation and soil characteristics. Herders’ perceptions of land degradation were influenced by livestock production performance, from which they inferred other qualitative indicators, in addition to biophysical and anthropogenic indicators. From the observations made, there is no evidence of permanent land degradation around the settlements in either the sub- humid or the arid lowlands, which could be attributed to pastoral sedentarization. On the contrary, even the areas reported as desertified some 25 years ago have shown recovery. The findings also support the recent “greening of the sahel” which has been marked by vegetation recovery after the return of normal rains. In this study, both stochastic rainfall and management practices contributed to the reversal of desertification. From the results we may conclude that local community participation in assessment and monitoring of environment change in the grazing lands of northern Kenya would contribute to the successful implementation of GECs at community levels. The thesis showed that integrated methods would improve local communities’ participation in the implementation of GECs.
The most important contribution of this thesis is the evidence about the ability of herders to assess and monitor environmental change, and the use of herder knowledge for selecting sensitive indicators that meet the criteria defined in the articles of GECs, particularly those related to the CCD and the CBD. The thesis makes specific recommendations for achieving the global goals through local actions that are linked to traditional pastoral production in northern Kenya.
Key words: Biodiversity; global environmental conventions; herder indicators; ecological indicators;
land degradation; local participation
1. Introduction
This thesis aims to develop a methodological framework for achieving local participation in the implementation of global environmental conventions such as the Convention on Combating Desertification (CCD) and the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). The study involved assessment and monitoring of land degradation, desertification and biodiversity loss in the grazing lands of northern Kenya. The rationale of the thesis is that participatory environmental assessment and monitoring in arid zones in Sub-Saharan Africa in general, and northern Kenya in particular, have been constrained by the lack of involvement of local communities. Instead, assessment and monitoring of environmental problems have relied exclusively on conventional ecological methods and indicators selected by scientists. This happens in spite of the global environmental conventions (GECs) such as CCD and CBD placing strong emphasis on the need for participation by local communities (UNCED, 1992). Among the factors that have impeded local participation in the implementation of the GECs is a lack of integration of indigenous knowledge and ecological methods (Seely and Moser, 2004; Oba et al., 2008). An integrated methodological approach is therefore needed to address environmental degradation, particularly that associated with changes in land use intensification and desertification around sedentary nomadic settlements (Lusigi, 1981).
Sedentarization of pastoral populations is either voluntary, as an adaptation to changes in economic and environmental conditions, or through forceful settlements by states for purposes of development or economic rehabilitation (Salzman, 1980). Whatever the cause, pastoral sedentarization has environmental consequences. In Sahelian Africa, over-exploitation of vegetation resources around settlements is reported to be responsible for inducing desertification (Swift 1975;
Mabbutt 1984; Mabbutt 1985; Thomas et al., 2000). Pastures are said to be depleted, showing dramatic declines along gradients of land use pressure by livestock grazing. Depletion of woody species around settlements is reported to be associated with over-exploitation of woody plants for the construction of livestock night enclosures (Lamprey and Yussuf 1981), the collection of wood for fuel (Benjaminsen, 1993), cultivation (Lamprey, 1976), and over-browsing by livestock (Oba, 1998; Oba et al., 2000a). The changes are pertinent to the principal goals of the GECs, which are concerned with reversing such problems through better ecological understanding and improved land management.
In northern Kenya, pastoral sedentarization has been associated with land degradation and desertification (Lamprey and Yussuf, 1981; Lusigi 1984). The problem has been captured within the
global debate of environmental degradation and desertification. Many of the scholarly research conducted during the 1970s emphasized environmental degradation, both in the sub-humid zones and the arid lowlands, where land use associated with pastoralists’ sedentarization was blamed.
However, previous attempts to assess and monitor land degradation induced by pastoralists’
sedentarization in northern Kenya used scientific methods alone (Lusigi et al., 1986, Hary et al., 1996, Keya, 1997; Oba et al., 2003). In the earlier attempts, local community knowledge on environmental change was ignored and, no effort was made to integrate local people’s knowledge with ecological assessments. However, the local communities were usually blamed for contributing to the process of environmental degradation around sedentary settlements (Field, 1981). Due to the exclusion of local people, the findings from environmental assessments, including those of northern Kenya, have remained contradictory and the implementation of the GECs has been poorly addressed (see section 2.0 of this thesis). This thesis aims to close the gaps by proposing an effective method for integrating the indigenous knowledge of pastoral herders with ecological methods used by trained scientists. The thesis attempts this task by developing participatory methods, testing the efficacy of the methods and complementing indigenous knowledge with conventional ecological methods, as a process that will finally be aimed at meeting the global goals using local actions. The research is conceptualized within the wider global goals related to the implementation of the GECs at local community levels.
1.1 Background to the study
During the previous four decades, the Ariaal and Rendille pastoralists’ systems of livestock management in northern Kenya have been transformed from mobile to sedentary systems (Oba, 1994). The process of settlement by nomads was accelerated as a result of drought disasters that impoverished many herders in the 1970s, forcing them into famine relief camps. In the sub-humid zone, the settlements in Karare, in the Marsabit District, were initially developed to rehabilitate destitute nomads by means of crop cultivation, while in the arid lowlands, the Rendille settled around the main towns of Kargi and Korr to receive food relief (Fig. 1). Later, the government and missionaries initiated development programs that encouraged pastoralists to settle around these towns, which had grown into administrative, educational and security centers that provided watering facilities for humans and livestock. Despite the changed patterns of land use, the Ariaal and Rendille
pastoralists maintained mobility of their herds, while the greater proportion of the human population remained in the sedentary settlements. The main concerns for the scholarly discussions in the 1970s were the impact of sedentary land use on the scarce vegetation resources. The scientists of the UNESCO-Integrated Project on Arid Lands (IPAL), who conducted much of the earlier work, were concerned about the accelerating land degradation and loss of vegetation cover, due to the over- exploitation of woody vegetation for the construction of night enclosures (boma), as well as overgrazing associated with high livestock stocking densities around the settlements. One estimate suggests that within the settlement rangelands, livestock stocking densities exceeded 25 Tropical Livestock Units per km, whereas in the remote rangelands the stocking densities were much lower.
The heavy stocking was linked to the lack of woody plant regeneration (Lamprey, 1976).
The research goals of the UNESCO-IPAL project were to understand the state of land degradation and livestock production within 18,000 km2 of the home range of the Rendille and the Ariaal pastoralists. Using vegetation maps, the grazing lands were delineated according to vegetation units (hereafter referred to as range units) that corresponded with grazing landscapes used for seasonal grazing by the multi-species livestock comprising sheep, goats, cattle and camels.
During the initial surveys conducted throughout the grazing home range of the Ariaal and the Rendille pastoralists, the conclusion was that the conditions of the rangelands varied from “fair” to
“poor”, except for a few vegetation types in the sub-humid zone of Marsabit mountain that were rated as “good” (Lusigi, 1984). Around the settlements, increased extraction of woody vegetation for building human shelters and livestock enclosures resulted in reduced woody cover, while livestock grazing pressure was reported to have had negative impacts on the herbaceous vegetation and woody species regeneration (Walther and Herlocker, 1980; Lamprey and Yussuf, 1981). In the lowlands, vegetation around settlements was over-utilized and the vegetation communities were mapped as “man-made deserts”, which in the arid lowlands, extended up to a distance of 8 km from the settlements (Lusigi, 1984). The general scientific perception at the time was that the man-made deserts around the settlements were expanding and threatening the surrounding grazing lands. The perception was influenced by discourses at the time on the topic of Sahelian desertification (Lamprey, 1983).
Although an interdisciplinary team of researchers conducted the investigations aimed at placing the people central to the problem, there was little evidence that the ecological research
included the local herders in conducting environmental assessments.1 Despite this lack, the anthropological research uncovered explicitly the wealth of knowledge that the pastoralists had in managing their arid environments (O’Leary, 1985). However, mostly the scientific empirical ecological research findings were used to influence the recommendations proposed by the management plan (Lusigi, 1984).
The management plan considered policy recommendations for the development of the Ariaal and Rendille rangelands, emphasizing the need for considering development according to local socio-economic needs and priorities set by the local people. However, it gave little weight to the role of indigenous knowledge in resource management, by recommending that “range areas should be developed, conserved, and managed in accordance with the ecological principles of proper land use” (Lusigi, 1984:484). At the time, the thinking of the IPAL research team was influenced by the equilibrium ecological theory that readily blamed the pastoralists for causing desertification due to high livestock stocking densities around settlements resulting in over-exploitation of vegetation resources (Field, 1981). Interestingly enough, whereas the ecological component of the project concluded that the environmental changes were permanent, leading to “desertification”, the social scientists in the team placed the problem within the wider socio-economic and political discourses (e.g. O’Leary, 1984).
By comparison, the assessment and monitoring of the status of the rangelands in northern Kenya conducted by UNEP and the Government of Kenya a few years after the IPAL project (Ottichilo, 1990), was more conservative concerning environmental degradation. The UNEP study used remote sensing and ground surveys of indicators of degradation, including physical (climate and soil), biological (vegetation) and socio-economic indicators, to model different processes influencing environmental change. It was concluded that the rangelands of northern Kenya, including those of the Marsabit District, had not suffered adverse changes over the monitoring periods. Another study by Herlocker and Walther (1991) reported that less than 1% of the district was in “poor” environmental condition. The discrepancies between the IPAL results of the 1970s and 1980s, and those of 1990s imply that there was inconsistency in the evaluations of land degradation. The present study therefore used the IPAL work as a baseline for monitoring and assessing vegetation changes around four main settlements, using multiplicities of methods that
1 Much of the environmental awareness was, however, conducted by means of training local herders (see Oba, 1985a, 1985b; Lusigi, 1984).
fully integrated herder indigenous knowledge with ecological methods, in order to understand the dynamics of land degradation.
This thesis is aimed at improving the understanding of environmental changes in the sub- humid and the arid lowland systems of northern Kenya since the UNESCO-IPAL research was conducted in the early 1980s. The sub-humid zone and the arid lowlands were selected to represent the two dominant production systems used by the Ariaal (cattle) pastoralists and the Rendille (camel) pastoralists, respectively. According to the assessments of UNESCO-IPAL, the sub-humid zone suffered less environmental degradation, while the arid lowlands experienced localized desertification. This thesis explores the state of degradation processes across the two systems in the time period since the previous studies.
The individual studies in the thesis were guided by the general hypothesis that, due to their ecological dispositions, the two systems have experienced different environmental changes under the influence of local land use in terms of livestock management. Throughout the thesis, the two systems were, however, not directly compared for the following reasons. Firstly, the impact of stocking density in both systems was unknown due to a lack of reliable livestock census data, and frequent livestock movements between the two systems. Secondly, the most important variable in measuring environmental change was vegetation characteristics. The two systems, due to differences in the levels of rainfall, altitude and topography, display differences in vegetation characteristics in terms of species composition and cover, regardless of levels of use. Thirdly, the study used local knowledge of the Ariaal and Rendille pastoralists. Since the two groups use different ecosystems, it was assumed that their knowledge of environmental change would differ;
thus preference was given to using the knowledge of the two pastoral groups to understand environmental changes in their local land use contexts. Nonetheless, the selection of the sub-humid (equilibrium) and the arid zones (non-equilibrium) was useful in understanding the characteristics of vegetation changes that might be explained in terms of existing ecological theories. Furthermore, the use of different ecosystems was useful in investigating whether concepts such as land degradation and desertification might be relative to (a) use consistent with indigenous knowledge and (b) who is assessing and monitoring − the herders or the ecologists.
1.2. Organization of the thesis
This thesis is divided into two parts. Part A is the synthesis of a framework for the integration of indigenous knowledge and ecological methods for assessment and monitoring of environmental change at the local level (see section 2.0). The nine sections in this part of the thesis present the theoretical framework necessary for linking the implementation of the GECs and local communities’ actions to ecological principles. In section two of Part A, a brief description of the participatory research is presented and the frequently used terms in the thesis are defined in the context of their use. In section three, the theoretical perspectives for integrating indigenous knowledge and scientific methods are discussed. In section four, the methodological perspectives for achieving the integration of indigenous knowledge and ecological methods are described. In section five, the mechanisms for developing integration are given, using a schematic framework that links global and local goals. In section six, the steps followed in the implementation of the framework at local community levels in northern Kenya are described. In the seventh section, the synthesis of the key findings of the four case studies is provided. The eighth section provides discussions on the implications for the global goals. The final section of Part A provides conclusions and recommendations. In Part B of the thesis, four papers from the individual studies are presented.
The general objectives of the thesis were as follows:
(1) To develop a methodological framework for integrating indigenous knowledge and ecological methods for achieving the implementation of GECs at local community levels. The theoretical and methodological considerations for integrating indigenous knowledge and ecological methods were reviewed.
(2) To understand the impact of sedentarization on the vegetation in the sub-humid and the arid lowlands. Key questions for addressing this objective included: How did herders’ livestock management strategies affect livestock distribution in the rangelands around settlements? What were the impacts of sedentarization on the vegetation around settlements?
(3) To understand herders’ knowledge of biodiversity assessment and monitoring at landscape level.
The key questions were: What were the herders’ landscape classification criteria; What indicators did the herders use for floral biodiversity assessment and monitoring; and what roles did the herders’ biodiversity assessment and monitoring play in the decision making process for livestock management?
(4) To understand herders’ perceptions of land degradation and the influence it had on herd management strategies. The questions posed were: What were herders’ perceptions of “good” or
“bad” environments? What indicators did the herders use for assessment and monitoring change in environments from “good” to “bad”, for purposes of livestock management?
(5) To evaluate the efficacy of herders and ecological assessment and monitoring of long-term environmental changes in arid rangelands. The research questions were: What were the changes in vegetation characteristics in the communal grazing area over a period of 24 years (1982/1983- 2005/2006)? What were the changes in vegetation cover around the Kargi and Korr settlements over a period of 14 years (1986-2000)? What factors contributed to vegetation cover changes in the communal rangelands and around the settlements of Kargi and Korr?
1.3. Study sites
The study sites were located in the sub-humid zone (Karare and Lkijiji) and the arid low lands (Korr and Kargi) of the Marsabit District (Fig. 1).
Figure 1. Location of study sites on a map of the Marsabit District
The Karare and Lkijiji sites receive a mean annual rainfall of about 600 mm per year (Fig. 2a). The rainfall is bimodal, divided into the long rains (March to June) and the short rains (October and November) (Fig. 2b). The vegetation of the sub-humid zone is classified as Pennisetum/Bothriochloa (Perennial grassland) (Awere-Gyekye, 1984). The Ariaal herders, who manage cattle and small stock, also conduct limited cultivation (the later system of land use is not discussed in this thesis). For about 30 years, the area has experienced continuous livestock grazing, mainly by cattle and small stock around the permanent settlements clusters of Karare and Lkijiji.
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 1400 1600 1800 2000
1935 1940 1945 1950 1955 1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000
Rainfall (mm)
Year
Figure 2a. Annual rainfall for Marsabit town
0 50 100 150 200 250 300
Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec
Mean rainafall (mm)
Months
Figure 2b. Mean monthly rainfall for Marsabit town between 1935 and 2004
0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400
1980 1982 1984 1986 1988 1990 2000 2002 2004 2006
Years
Rainfall (mm)
Figure 2c. Total annual rainfall for the Kargi station
The arid lower lands of Korr and Kargi (Fig.1) receive less than 200 mm of annual rainfall, which is highly variable both temporally (Fig. 2c), and spatially (Pratt and Gwynne, 1977). Droughts are frequent in the area (Bake, 1983). The vegetation is mainly dwarf shrubs dominated by Indigofera spinosa and I. cliffodiana, and bushland dominated by Acacia sp. (Lusigi et al., 1986). The major land use type is grazing by multi-species livestock managed from pastoral camps (gob).
In the sub-humid system, cattle and small stock herds are split into the home and the fora herds (Fratkin, 1986; Fratkin, 1987). During the wet season, the fora cattle are moved to the lowlands to exploit available fresh grasses and surface water. During the dry season, the mobile fora camps return to the home rangelands and the livestock are watered at the wells in the Marsabit Forest Reserve. The small stock remains close to the permanent settlements in the sub-humid zone.
At the settlements, fewer animals (cattle and small stock) are managed for milking. But generally there is a circulation of livestock (milk vs. dry herds) between the settlements and the fora systems.
The milk animals are brought back to the settlements and the dry animals are sent to the fora.
Besides the sub-humid zones around Mt. Marsabit, the Ariaal pastoralists are also found around Logo Logo (approximately 40 km to the south of Marsabit), Merrile (approximately 100 km to the south of Marsabit) and around the Ndoto and Mathews mountain ranges bordering the Samburu District in the south. The Ariaal residing around the Ndoto Mountains and Mathews Range use the surrounding lowlands, in a similar way to their counterparts on the slopes of the Marsabit Mountain. According to Fratkin (1987), the Ariaal have remained nomadic, with some sub-clans occupying highland areas subsisting on cattle, while others living in the lowland areas manage
camels. The livestock species managed by the Ariaal clans have different grazing requirements and are therefore herded as a separate group, resulting in high labour demands (Fratkin, 1987). The Ariaal living in the lowlands have adopted the Rendille cultural lifestyle, while the Rendille in the sub-humid zones have become bilingual in Maa and Rendille. The practice of intermarriage has created shifting identities between the two communities.
In the arid lowlands, the Rendille pastoralists also practice herd splitting into mobile satellite camps (fora) and home herds (gob) (Fratkin and Smith, 1994). The camel mobile camps are located far from settlements and water points. The home settlements are positioned near permanent water points, as cattle and small stock need to be watered more frequently (Fratkin, 1986). Each Rendille clan resides in separate pastoral camps where the elders meet in the evening at a gathering in the centre of the camp called naabo, to discuss matters such as the state of grazing, livestock management and other matters of importance to the community. Aerial surveys of the camps done by IPAL in 1982/1983 show that the camps had 17-23 houses on average and 47% were located around the major settlements centers of Kargi, Korr, Logo Logo and Laisamis (O’Leary, 1985).
Unlike the Ariaal settlements, the Rendille pastoral camps are frequently moved and each time the moves are made, sometimes just a short distance away, new thorny trees are cut to build night livestock enclosures. Once a year the Rendille bring all their livestock and people to the main camps for the almado and sorio ritual ceremonies (O’Leary, 1984; Fratkin 1986, 1987; Schlee 1991). The greatest threat to the environment is therefore over-harvesting of woody plants for the construction of night livestock enclosures (boma) and the greater frequencies of camp movements that require fresh tree materials each time. Consequently, the areas around the camps have been over-exploited and supplies of fencing materials have become scarce. In the settlements, where people previously transported fencing materials, the Rendille now use camels to ferry in the same materials from long distances. The environmental impact has important implications for the implementation of GECs at local community levels.
2. Integration of global goals and local actions
Participatory research and development is rooted in the shift in theories from modernization theory associated with top-down technological transfer, to neo-populist theory that advocates for local people participation – which uses bottom-up approaches in research and development (Sillitoe, 1998). The proponents of bottom-up or local participation approaches, present convincing
arguments that local people have accumulated a wealth of knowledge over time, based on long-term experiences, that can complement scientific knowledge in environmental conservation (Richards, 1980; Knight, 1980). Major emphasis is placed on the roles indigenous knowledge and local management play in conservation (Warren, 1992; Berkes et al., 2000), and protection of the land from degradation (see below for definitions). Additionally, there is growing interest on how indigenous knowledge and management practices can be used in collaboration with standard scientific methods for improving understanding of the environment (Dahlberg, 2000; Reed et al., 2007). Global environmental problems and the need for local participation were discussed during international conferences related to UNCOD and UNCED, where participating nations agreed on joint action plans. Since environmental changes are attributed to a multitude of factors (Geist, 2005), appropriate methods and sensitive indicators are needed for assessment and monitoring.
For the above reasons, Agenda 21 of the Rio Conference recognizes the role local communities play in environmental assessment and management (UNCED, 1992). According to Agenda 21, partnerships with local communities aim to achieve the global goals for the sustainable use of natural resources. For example, the role of indigenous knowledge in combating desertification and droughts is contained in Agenda 21, Chapter 12 part 18 (d), which states that the United Nations seeks to “promote participatory management of natural resources, including rangeland, to meet both the needs of rural populations and conservation purposes, based on innovative or adapted indigenous technologies”. Further, Agenda 21, Chapter 12, subsection 23 (a), states that government should “integrate indigenous knowledge related to forests, forest lands, rangeland and natural vegetation into research activities on desertification and drought”. In relation to the conservation of biological diversity, Agenda 21, Chapter 15, part 4 (g) states that global partners should “recognize and foster the traditional methods and the knowledge of indigenous people ...relevant to the conservation of biological diversity and the sustainable use of biological resources”.
Various nations are signatories to the global conventions through the ratification of the different articles. The national goals are to implement the conventions by means of National Action Programs (NAPs), which in turn, comprise strategies and methods for implementing the global goals. Considering the broad geographical, and ecological variability, and the socio-economic factors linked to the process of environmental change, there is no single indicator that may be used for the assessment and monitoring thereof. The goals at the national level therefore include linking
scientific assessment and monitoring activities with the environmental management practices of local communities. For example, according to Article 10 (f) of UNCCD (1994), parties to the convention should: “provide for effective participation of local, national and regional levels of non- governmental organization and local population, …..particularly resource users including farmers and pastoralists and their respective organization in policy planning, decision making and review of national programs.”
Additionally, according to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), each member state party to the convention is obliged to promote local participation in the management of biological diversity. Article 8j of the CDB states:
“Subject to its national legislation, respect, preserve and maintain knowledge, innovations and practices of indigenous and local communities embodying traditional lifestyles relevant for the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity and promote their wider application with the approval and involvement of the holders of such knowledge, innovations and practices and encourage the equitable sharing of the benefits arising from the utilization of such knowledge, innovations and practices.”
The NAPs can benefit from global mechanisms (such as the Global Environmental Facility) that make technology and funds available for initiating implementation activities by means of local participation. By tapping into local knowledge systems, environmental assessment and monitoring in response to anthropogenic and natural ecosystem drivers at local levels can be achieved (Krugman, 1996). Previously, the use of indigenous knowledge for promoting local participatory assessment and monitoring of environmental change was constrained by the lack of integration of local knowledge systems with scientific methods. Conducting evaluations and monitoring human impacts on the environment are pre-requisites for accomplishing the implementation of the GECs.
The purpose of this study is therefore to shift the approach to enable local communities, such as herders, and ecologists to be partners in the assessment and monitoring of the implementation of the GECs at community levels, using traditional systems of land use. Rather than discussing the actual implementation of the GECs, the main purpose of the thesis is to discuss the potential application of integrated methods for implementing the goals of NAPs at local community levels.
The success of the integration of local knowledge in environmental assessment and monitoring is influenced by shifts in theoretical viewpoints on environmental discourses. Such discourses in turn
determine the type of research methods that can be used to link management objectives of local communities and conservation goals. Participatory methods face challenges in terms of questions relating to “how” local knowledge can be used − how to collaborate with conventional scientific methods and understand the perspectives of indigenous knowledge, particularly how it functions in relation to environmental change. Whereas the need for integrating participatory knowledge with conventional scientific methods is often demanded as a prerequisite for achieving global participation, any frameworks for achieving such integration are poorly documented (for a recent attempt, see Dougill and Reed 2006; Oba et al., 2008).
A schematic framework for understanding how the objectives of the GECs could be used to guide national and local actions to achieve global and local goals is proposed in this study.
Integrated methods (see Fig. 3, section 5) based on local environmental knowledge and ecological methods were tested to show how the broader global objectives for the implementations of GECs such as the CCD and CBD could be tackled at local community levels. Before discussing the approaches used for achieving these goals at community levels, it is necessary for the reader to be familiar with how some of the terminologies and concepts were applied in this thesis.
2.1. Definition of terms and concepts
In this thesis different terms are used in relation to the assessment and monitoring of land degradation and biodiversity loss. The terms are explained within the context of their use, and therefore universal agreement is not presumed. For example, the knowledge held by the local communities has been described using different terms including: “indigenous knowledge”, “local knowledge”, “folk knowledge”, “indigenous technical knowledge” (ITK), “traditional ecological knowledge” (TEK) and “indigenous ecological knowledge” (IEK), among others. Each of the terms has a different connotation in terms of importance and the application of knowledge by different communities. In this thesis, some of the terms are used interchangeably to describe the knowledge held by local communities. These knowledge systems are used by individuals but represent the sum total of knowledge used by particular local communities (Roba and Oba, 2008). However, reference is made to the most popular terms, such as “indigenous knowledge/local knowledge” and
“traditional ecological knowledge” to describe the roles local communities play in environmental management. According to Warren (1991), the term “indigenous knowledge” describes the
knowledge developed by a given community, which is different from scientific knowledge systems generated through universities or at government research stations. Indigenous ecological knowledge refers to experiences acquired over a lifetime through observations and in relation to social norms and institutions that shape human interaction with the environment (Berkes et al., 2000; Fernandez- Gimenez, 2000). Such knowledge is useful, for example, in describing concepts such as land degradation.
“Land degradation” is a composite term and the definition depends on the context used by both scientists (Stocking and Murnaghan, 2001; Warren 2002) and local communities (Oba and Kotile, 2001). In general, land degradation is defined as the loss of utility or potential in relation to biological organisms as well as changes in the physical environment that would alter the functions of natural systems (Abel and Blaikie, 1989; Barrow, 1991). According to Dodd (1994), degradation may refer to a decrease in plant productivity or unfavorable changes in species composition, but does not imply that changes are permanent. In the rangelands, Abel and Blaikie (1989), defined land degradation as a permanent decline in land for the yielding of livestock products under a given system of production. This means that in terms of pastoral production, where milk and meat are major products, land degradation leads to a downward spiral in livestock productivity. In pastoral systems where multiple livestock species are managed, better insight about the processes of environmental change can be gained by considering herders’ perceptions. Herders define land degradation in relation to livestock productivity. A degraded environment, according to herders, does not support livestock productivity at optimal levels due to the loss of important fodder species.
Accordingly, a landscape that is degraded for one species of livestock e.g. grazers, may not be so for browsers. Throughout this thesis, a broader approach to understanding land degradation is adopted, rather than narrow ecological definitions alone. In all cases, land degradation will be considered to be reversible under improved systems of management.
Ecologists also use other terms such as “desertification” when referring to extreme levels of land degradation. The concept of desertification implies both temporal and spatial perspectives.
Internationally, desertification is defined as “land degradation in arid, semi-arid and dry sub-humid areas resulting from various factors, including climatic variations and human activities” (UNCCD, 1994). The nature, extent and reversibility of the changes associated with desertification have been at the center of scholarly debates (e.g. Stiles, 1995; Thomas and Middleton, 1994; Helldén, 1988).
In this thesis, the terms desertification and land degradation are used concurrently, but often
“desertification” implies permanent and irreversible changes in vegetation and soil conditions, whereas “land degradation” is used to describe changes which are reversible with management or when the anthropogenic pressures are removed. Given that the classification of both degradation and desertification might rely on similar indicators (see section 5), the issue is at what levels changes would be described as simple degradation or as desertification. One of the important indicators for evaluating land degradation and desertification is changes in floral biodiversity.
“Biodiversity”, or biological diversity, is a broad concept that describes the variety of all living life forms encompassing species, genetics and ecosystems. In this thesis, the focus of biodiversity is mainly on the diversity of plant species. In the assessment and monitoring of changes in plant species diversity, conservation interests are based on the assumption that loss of species diversity (number of different species) and species richness (number of species per unit area) are important criteria for assessing ecosystem degradation. In the grazing lands, herders are concerned with satisfactory livestock production. Therefore the concept of the total species pool, which is important from the conservation viewpoint, does not adequately capture herders’ requirements.
According to herders, changes in biodiversity in the grazing lands refers to changes in plant species composition in relation to livestock fodder requirements (Mapinduzi et al., 2003; Roba and Oba, 2008). By focusing on key forage species, the herders use utilitarian definitions of biodiversity. The concept of invasive species is well known to ecologists, while herders refer to “bad” or “good”
biodiversity in terms of the extent of unpalatable plant species, such as those that might be associated with bush encroachment. In this thesis, the use of the term “biodiversity” refers to both the conservation and utilitarian values in terms of how it is assessed and monitored.
“Assessment” and “monitoring” of vegetation are relative terms used for understanding environmental dynamics. “Assessment” refers to observation of the status of various indicators that influence environmental health. It involves evaluation at one point in time to generate baseline data on vegetation and soil physical characteristics. For herders, assessment is done more frequently across the grazing landscape to ensure an acceptable quality and quantity of fodder for multiple livestock species. Ecological assessment of grazing ecosystems is less frequent and on limited spatial scales. Observations are usually made at a series of sampling transects and plots in order to generate data that are used to generalize the status of grazing resources. By comparison,
“monitoring” is an evaluation process conducted several times over long periods to determine responses to management and other environmental factors such as rainfall (Holecheck et al., 1995).
Monitoring of important environmental variables, such as change in species composition, is conducted using similar methods, for the same objectives and over a long period of time. The observed trends in the variables monitored can then be related to different drivers. Herders’
assessment and monitoring of environmental change is not limited to environmental indicators, but includes livestock production performances such as volume of milk and animal body condition. In this thesis, assessment and monitoring describe activities conducted by herders and ecologists to determine the suitability of the grazing environment on short-term and long-term basis. Assessment and monitoring must be conducted by range managers to understand how management has influenced the condition of the rangelands (short term) and trends (long term changes) in environmental indicators.
Vegetation “condition” and “trends” are terms commonly used to describe “the state of range health” (NRC, 1994). Range condition is scaled in terms of the “climax” vegetation. The use of the concept is limited due to difficulties in establishing a climax vegetation composition for determining change in arid zones. The idea of using climax vegetation for determining “healthy”
range condition shows that the term is closely related to the equilibrium ecological theory. In this thesis the concept is used in relation to the “range status” which the herders consider as being optimal for livestock production, while ecologists use the term to mean a departure from the assumed “climax” vegetation status. Thus in this thesis, the term “condition” is used in relation to utilization. “Trend” refers to the direction of change of range condition, which can be rated as upward, downward or stable (Holecheck et al., 1995). To describe trend, an observation of change in species composition is required. In pastoral systems, herders have accumulated knowledge of the direction of vegetation change more so than ecologists.
Another term that appears often in the thesis is “integration” which, as used here, implies the combined use of local knowledge and scientific methods to understand environmental change.
Integration of assessment and monitoring of environmental change is achieved by the simultaneous use of multiple indicators used by local people and ecologists. The local communities use indigenous knowledge and composite indicators (hereafter also referred to as “anthropogenic”
indicators), while ecologists use ecological methods and ecological indicators. The integration of local knowledge and ecological methods improves understanding of environmental change, as the two systems complement each other. Thus, could integration be achieved by asking the local informants questions about the environment and using ecological methods to measure required
variables? Or does integration involve a whole range of processes of environmental assessment and monitoring and decision-making? In this thesis integration is taken as a process that finally leads to rational decisions. Creating a situation for sharing information and understanding different viewpoints by local communities as well as by scientifically trained technicians, resulted in a common forum for discussing the problems of the environment. This approach has been the goal of this thesis. By jointly using the different methods it was possible to understand the perceptions about the reversibility of land degradation, which is related to the concept of “resilience”.
The concept of ecological resilience was described by Holling (1973) to describe changes in ecosystems when subjected to perturbation. Resilience is defined as the capacity of a system to buffer or resist change in response to a given magnitude of disturbance, before losing the capacity to respond (Gunderson, 2000; Perrings and Walker 1995). The level of resilience can be defined in terms of systems potential. In grazing lands, for example, different landscapes disclose varied
“potential” in relation to soils and vegetation. The potential of the resource system describes the capacity of the system to resist degradation. In this thesis, the concept of ecological resilience is used to understand change in species composition and vegetation structure. Long-term fluctuations in vegetation variables were examined to see if they present a characteristic of resilience under unpredictable rainfall regimes, or if they portray a more linear change as presented by the equilibrium ecological model. In addition, variables such as species inventory, change species frequency, and species cover over long periods of time are important for understanding the resilience of an ecosystem after years of droughts and sustained grazing pressure. The capacity of the system to spring back is what allows land degradation in arid ecosystems to be reversible; the lack of resilience would cause desertification (Binns, 1990; Oba et al., 2008). Herders are aware of the resilient property of arid ecosystems, based on several years of observation. In arid ecosystems, the concept of resilience has helped herders to develop adaptive management strategies that enable them to modify their management strategy according to prevailing environmental conditions. Using their knowledge of individual landscapes and their capacity to cope with grazing pressures, herders regulate grazing movements allowing the land to regenerate, even after heavy use. This shows that management strategies have an influence on the resilience of an ecosystem (e.g. Perrings and Walker, 1997).
Each of the concepts or terms discussed here elicits different discourses in terms of environmental change. It is important to mention that no single theoretical viewpoint can adequately
address the different discourses, necessitating the application of an interdisciplinary approach for understanding the process of environmental change. The terms discussed above are used in this thesis for discussing different theoretical and methodological perspectives related to local community participation in the implementations of the GECs related to the CCD and the CBD. The concepts are important for understanding continuous shifts in paradigms of environmental change from deterministic cause-effect views to multi-directional approaches that acknowledge the influence of environmental variability and the importance of indigenous knowledge.
3. Theoretical perspectives
Major environmental discourses have played a central role in shaping how environmental problems are perceived. The dominant environmental discourses such as desertification and biodiversity loss have attempted to portray a crisis scenario, especially in marginal environments (Lamprey, 1983).
Increases in human and livestock populations have been associated with adverse effects on the environment. The crisis narratives are rooted in different environmental theories, which predict the relationships between biotic and abiotic, social-ecological and economic components of an ecosystem. For example, different viewpoints of land degradation in arid ecosystems have been influenced by different scientific theories. The ecological theories reflect a priori environmental functions in terms of processes, explained in terms of deductive relationships between causes and effects of land degradation. Management is often not part of the theory, although the impact of management on the environment uses the theory to analyze the effects. This implies that local knowledge in environmental assessment and monitoring is usually not part of the theory description and verification. This was until recently, when ecologists re-evaluated existing ecological theories for guiding management decisions, particularly in arid lands (Behnke and Scoones, 1993), for the following reasons. Firstly, ecological theories do not explain all the outcomes of environmental change, particularly where management or human decisions in land use are involved. Secondly, for ecosystems such as arid lands, earlier ecological theories had assumed stability, while the system behavior is better described by variability. Empirical evidence in support of spatial and temporal variability questioned the value of using ecological theories that prescribed stability and predictability (Ellis and Swift 1988). The stable and predictable systems failed to acknowledge the management systems of local resource users, while the variable systems considered the rationale of
local resource use. These developments therefore became the impetus for the integration of indigenous knowledge and ecological methods.
Various viewpoints from the perspective of the dynamics of vegetation in arid ecosystems in response to land use by local pastoralists are reviewed here. Since the early days of range management as a science (e.g. Clements 1916), ecologists considered proper management in terms of the equilibrium between grazer populations and allowable forage utilization (Heady 1975). This theory holds that range managers should maintain the numbers of grazers on a given range commensurate with its potential carrying capacity − which is defined as the maximum stock carried per unit of land in a given time (Pratt and Gwynne, 1977; Bartels et al., 1993). The theory presumes that it is the grazers that drive the changes in plant composition and therefore by regulating stocking levels, the dynamics of vegetation can be maintained at desirable levels of plant composition to promote environmental sustainability.
The equilibrium theory, which is described above in a simplified version, is deterministic and uni-directional, since it does not take into consideration environmental drivers, such as rainfall variability, as the principal control agents for driving range production. Indeed, the theory, which was designed under humid conditions, might work adequately in ecosystems with predictable rainfall, but problems arose in arid environments (Ellis and Swift, 1988). Using the responses of vegetation parameters to herbivore populations, the theory would predict negative changes when the population exceeds the carrying capacity or the stocking potential (Lamprey and Yussuf, 1981;
Lamprey, 1983; Sinclair and Fryxell, 1985). Therefore, based on the equilibrium theory, land degradation that occurs in arid lands, would be blamed on management systems that ignore the
“equilibrial” relationships between nature’s functions and use.
The equilibrium model influenced early pastoral development throughout sub-Saharan Africa in a significant manner, with adverse consequences for the environment and production systems (Sandford, 1983). One such adverse consequence was sedentarization of former nomads that resulted in the breakdown of traditional systems of land use, causing precisely those environmental problems which the theory was meant to guard against (Sinclair and Fryxel, 1985). The proponents of the theory excluded local indigenous knowledge and purposely focused on the use of ecological indicators (see below) for environmental assessment and monitoring. There are, however, critical similarities between the equilibrium theory and its explanation of vegetation changes in relation to grazing pressures, and local knowledge of herders on how vegetation indicators respond to sustained
grazing. The equilibrium theory postulates that sustained grazing pressure induces shifts in plant species composition, where some species that are more sensitive decrease, while others, that are unpalatable or more resistant to grazing pressure, increase or remain stable. Careful analysis of indigenous knowledge shows that herders have comparable understanding about the species that would decrease, and others that would increase or remain stable. The qualifying difference is that according to the local herders, the shifts in plant species vary with the type of livestock. The implication is that land degradation cannot be a universal problem in grazing lands. The land degraded for grazing livestock would still be sustainable for browsing stock and vice versa.
Ecologists rarely took such views into account.
Shifts in ecological thinking (e.g. Ellis and Swift 1988) propose that vegetation changes in highly variable environments, such as in arid lands, are more sensitive to environmental drivers including rainfall variability, than they are to grazer populations. The non-equilibrium theory proposes that in environments with high coefficients of variation, the spatial-temporal dynamics of vegetation resources cannot be accounted for by grazing alone (Fernandez-Gimenez and Allen-Diaz 1999; Oba et al., 2000b; Sullivan and Rhode, 2002). Rather, the rhythms of range production are closely related to spatial and temporal rainfall variability. This means that the same environment might experience a “boom” at one time, and “burst” production at another, in response to varied rainfall regimes. Rainfall varies from season to season, resulting in substantial differences in range production according to seasons (temporally) and spatially by sites or geographical distribution of plant production. The non-equilibrium model of rangeland dynamics therefore puts emphasis on the unpredictable nature of ecosystems and the inability on the part of management to develop practical plans based on prior knowledge for manipulating stocking rates. Pastoral production, which involves livestock mobility, is adapted to variability (Fernandez-Gimenez and Allen-Diaz 1999;
Oba et al., 2000b). Pastoral land use systems track the variable resources opportunistically (Behnke and Scoones, 1993).
Herders are aware that plant species composition and cover change with variation in rainfall and across heterogeneous landscapes. Herders use this knowledge of seasonal and spatial variability of grazing resources to promote mobility. Local knowledge of resource management could therefore potentially contribute to the assessment and monitoring of the vegetation dynamics aimed at understanding the mechanisms described by different ecological models. The role of local
knowledge is deemed to be even more relevant when the dynamics of arid ecosystems are described using social-ecological resilience viewpoints.
According to the social-ecological resilience viewpoint, ecological processes are closely linked to social activities, including decisions on land use and livestock management (Berkes et al., 1998; Oba et al., 2008). In the social-ecological resilience model, adaptive management is central to pursuing livestock production goals. Pastoral adaptive management involves making adjustments to production variability by means of mobility. Thus, the explanation offered by the non-equilibrium theory about the dynamics of arid lands has closer parallels with the socio-ecological resilience theory. By means of the latter, the functions of indigenous knowledge in the management of variable environments can be justified. Based on their detailed knowledge of seasonal variations in species composition, herders might suggest that a particular plant species is not present at the time of assessment (e.g. in dry season), but will be seen again in the wet season. Thus, herders believe that arid ecosystems are highly resilient and in their view degradation occurs only when livestock mobility is curtailed and heavy grazing is sustained over a long period that would result in loss of key forage species.
The importance of local knowledge in addressing complex environmental problems has been supported further by interdisciplinary studies that used the principles of political ecology. Political ecology underscores the importance of environmental narratives and discourses for addressing desertification and biodiversity loss (Leach and Mearns, 1996; Batterbury et al., 1997; Laris, 2004).
Studies in human-environment relationships have shown that many of the environmental crises debated at global level are exaggerated (Bassett and Zuéli, 2000). The narratives advanced at global levels on the status of environment should be related to the counter narratives of local people (e.g.
Bassett and Crummey, 2003). Political ecology and environmental history therefore provide important links for analyzing human-environmental interactions (Benjaminsen and Lund, 2001).
Local communities’ narratives on causes and trajectories of environmental change are important for the implementation of the GECs, as well as in mitigating processes such as desertification and biodiversity loss.
Based on the above discussion, it is evident that processes of environmental change involve more than ecological changes and are influenced by social factors, including decision making by local land users (Blaikie and Brookfield, 1987; Oba et al., 2008). In the light of the recognition of the close interaction between social and ecological systems, there is a need to adopt a more holistic
