Rangelands, Drylands & Pastoralism

This report responds to heightened concerns over rising levels of farmer-herder conflict across a wide band of semi-arid Africa. We assess the quantitative evidence behind this general impression and review the explanations in the scientific literature, in the light of known issues with long-standing attitudes towards pastoralism and mobile populations.

PIM support to work from ILRI and partners contributed to adoption of a woreda (district) participatory land use planning approach in Ethiopia and to expansion of the joint village land use planning approach in Tanzania, resulting in more secure tenure rights for pastoralists in rangeland areas.

This study presents an integrated examination of both the ecosystem services (ES) and ecosystem disservices (EDS) associated with smallholder animal husbandry in rural livelihoods in three villages in southeast South Africa.

Nine Latin American countries plan to use silvopastoral practices—incorporating trees into grazing lands—to mitigate climate change. However, the cumulative potential of scaling up silvopastoral systems at national levels is not well quantified.

Diversified livelihoods combining farming, livestock keeping and non-farm income are characteristic of many rural households worldwide. For the Central Asian and Caucasian region, livestock keeping is especially important in terms of land use and socio-cultural heritage.

Livestock farming systems have an important role in the territorial systems of the Mediterranean, but in the last twenty years the sector has undergone serious changes with an important decrease in the number of farms.

Drought has detrimental impacts on crop and livestock farming systems worldwide, but less attention has been given to outdoor livestock systems, particularly in humid temperate regions.

Human populations and their use of land have reshaped landscapes for thousands of years, creating the anthropogenic biomes (anthromes) that now cover most of the terrestrial biosphere. Here we introduce the first global reconstruction and mapping of anthromes and their changes across the 12,000-year interval from 10,000 BCE to 2015 CE; the Anthromes 12K dataset.

Desertification is defined as land degradation occurring in the global drylands. It is one of the global problems targeted under the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG 15). The aim of this article is to review the history of desertification and to evaluate the scientific evidence for desertification spread and severity.

The Horn of Africa has seen its fair share of natural resource conflicts among and between competing pastoralists communities. The conflicts hitherto associated with men, ignored women pastoralists’ role in the same conflict. Using an existing data and an open-ended qualitative approach the study sought answers on the role of women pastoralists in conflict in the horn of Africa.

The paper focused on the need to document impacts of the global climate discourses at the local levels. In addition, it sought to fill the lacuna on the translation of discourses insofar as pastoralists land rights’ and adaptation are concerned, while looking at translation and implementation of these discourses.