Arid Climate, Adaptation and Cultural Innovation in Africa (ACACIA) UNIVERSITY OF COLOGNE Collaborative Research Centre 389
Dec 17, 2015
Arid Climate, Adaptation and Cultural Innovation in Africa (ACACIA)
UNIVERSITY OF COLOGNECollaborative Research Centre 389
Key Research Interest: Man-Environment Interaction under arid conditions
Spatial Focus:
* Northeast Africa (Egypt, Sudan, Chad, Libya),
* Southwest Africa (Namibia, South Africa, Botswana, Angola)
Time Focus:
the entire Holocene
Disciplines:
archaeology
linguistics
geography
botany
history
anthropology
egyptology
Key Hypothesis: Human societies rework their strategies of adaptationto an ecologically and (frequently also) politically instable environment continuously; natural resource management strategies as well as property rights are adapted to changing conditions.
Many case studies from arid Africa show that man has contributed to detrimental environmental changes (desertification; loss of biodiversity); however there have been attempts at all times and probablyin all societies to lower vulnerability and to ensure sustainable resource exploitation.
The key questions of ACACIA make an intense interdisciplinary perspective combining theories and methods from the natural and social sciences necessary.
Since the middle of the 19th century Africa‘s Arid Zones are affected fundamentally by global processes.
Historicizing man/environmentrelations makes the collaboration of historical sciences and cultural sciencesobligatory.
Reserves in Namibia in 1923
In southern Africa national parks as well as transboundary parks are founded and community based natural resource management is instituted. In northeastern Africa violence and the large scale armement of civil populations undermines governmental and international efforts; the influence of the state shrinks and anomic situations prevail .In many arid regions plans are contemplated and are carried out to builddams and/or channels for the production of electricity and irrigation.
In global visions Africa‘s arid zones are in need of international protec-tion and are developed as destinations for western tourists (ecotourism, holisticrange management)
Co-operation in southern Africa
Archaeology UCT & Wits
Desert Research Foundation, Namibia
PLAAS, UWC, NEPRU, NA
History, UWC, Anthropology, UCT
History, UNAM
Project Area A: Northeastern Africa - Holocene environmental and human history
A1 Climatic Change and Human Settlement between Nile Valley and the Central Sahara
A2 Wadi Howar - Prehistoric Occupation and Paleoenvironment
A3 Language and Cultural Change in NE Africa
A5 Environment and Society in Ancient Egypt
A6 Climate Change and Cultural History in the Ennedi/Chad
A7 Household Economy and Social Processes in the Ennedi/ Chad
Project Area B and C: Environmental Change, Settlement and Resource Management in SW Africa
B1 Migration, Settlement and Cultural History - Linguistic Sources
B4 Palaeoecology and Late Holocene Occupation in NW Namibia
B5 Soils, Colluvial, Alluvial and Aeolic Sediments as Evidence of Landscape Evolution
B7 Modelling Vulnerability in Kaokoveld - Remote Sensing
C1 Crisis Management and Risk Minimization
C10 Demographic, Economic and Social Transformations
C11 Landscape and Memory
C8 Ethnic Groups and Nationalities
Key Concepts: Hazards and Damages• Hazards, defined as ‘naturally occurring or human-induced
process(es) or event(s) with the potential to create loss, i.e. a general resource of danger.’ (Smith 1996:5). Environmental and socio-political processes may result in detrimental changes in an individual’s and household’s entitlements. While these changes do not result in easily noticeable losses they result in increasing vulnerability and the chance increases that future hazards have a disastrous impact.
• Damages result from hazards and are defined as any negative impact on entitlements and/or the well-being of individuals and groups. Damages are often unevenly spread within one population. The extent of damages is not only dependent on the severity of the hazard but also on the vulnerability of the household.
Key Concepts: Vulnerability and Risks
( Vulnerability is defined as „the expected damage as resulting from the expected environmental perturbations in view of the expected transformation and adaptation processes. (Corell, Cramer & Schellnhuber 2002:2)
( Risk relates to an unpredictable or hardly predictable event which has consequences that are perceived negatively. Risks are the culturally and socially embedded perceptions of future possible damages. A formal definition of risk implies:
– (a) it relates (i.e. a cognitive process of connecting phenomena) to a specific recognised event X
– (b) X brings about Y which is negatively evaluated (e.g. drought brings about livestock losses)
– (c) X lies in the future– (d) X is hardly predictable or unpredictable
Key Concepts: Resilience and Risk Minimization
• Resilience being defined as the ”capacity ... to tolerate disturbance without collapsing into a qualitatively different state that is controlled by a different set of processes” (a quality of a system!)
• Risk minimisation is based on the culturally and socially embedded assessments and perceptions of past and future damages. Risk minimisation may be based on conscious decisions or may be embedded in custom and refers to (a) attempts at eliminating the occurrence of negatively evaluated events, (b) to strategies to decrease vulnerability and (c) to limiting the impact of damages
once they have occurred (as activities of individuals and/or groups)
Key Questions
• How are hazards (how is vulnerability) generated within a system and how do external influences impact upon potential hazards?
• How are damages resulting from these hazards distributed within a population?
• How do social groups perceive, interpret and represent hazards, damages and vulnerability?
• Which individual/group strategies are applied to lower vulnerability (expand resilience) and to prevent damages?
19°
18°
17°
12° 13° 14°
O p u w o
O m u t a t i
O r u p e m b e
Sesfontein
O ka n g w a t i
K a o ko O t a v i
O m u ra m b a
O m u h o n g a
O p u w ob a d la n d s
0 50km
Angola
Kaokoland
Research on Vulnerability and Resilience in NW Namibia
Since 1995 ACACIA conducts research in NW Namibia.
Research on Vulnerability and Resilience in NW Namibia
• Data on settlement and environmental history for the entire holocene (archaeology, archaeobotany)
• Data on processes of environmental change (botany, geography)
• Data on demographic processes and household dynamics (anthropology)
• Data on environmental management and risk minizing strategies of local herders (anthropology)
Since 2002 an interdisciplinary group focusses on vulnerability and resilience
Trajectories of Vulnerability
• Demographic Processes• Environmental Decline (Desertification, Loss of
Diversity)• Entitlement Decline (Loss of Endowments, Loss
of Exchange Entitlements)• Drought• Livestock Epidemics
Trajectories of Vulnerability: Demographic Processes
Demographic Growth of different Namibia Groups
0
5000
10000
15000
20000
25000
30000
1872
1876
1912
1921
1928
1930
1933
1943
1951
1960
1970
1981
1982
1991
2020 Zeit ->
Be
völk
eru
ng
sza
hl
(Ba
ste
r,K
ao
kola
nd
)
0
500000
1000000
1500000
2000000
2500000
Be
völk
eru
ng
sza
hl
(Ova
mb
o,N
am
ibia
)
Baster in Rehoboth (Lang 1998) Kaokoland (Bollig und Lang 2001)Ovambo (Notkola und Siiskonen 2000) Namibia gesamt (US Census Bureau)
Consequences of Increasing Fertility and Increasing Mortality not clear!
Trajectories of Vulnerability: Increasing Regional Herd
Fig. The dynamics of the Regional Herd of Kaokoland (1940-2000 )
172933
92607
154926
60276
110580
128895
65500
122495
47190
0
20000
40000
60000
80000
100000
120000
140000
160000
180000
200000
Num ber of
Cattle
Source: Directorate of Veterinary Services, Page 1976, van Warmelo 1951;
Over the last 20 years the regional herd increased dramatically due to natural growth, and an extension of boreholes
Trajectories of Vulnerability: Entitlement Decline - Trade
In* 1917 the South African Administration banned any form of trade across the border into Portuguese Angola but also trade to neighbouring regions: consequence decline and disintegration of a regional trade system.
Only since 1970s emergence of a livestock market due to war-economy.
Trade in livestock still hampered by Government Regulations (Red Line!), lack of access to capital for local traders, and lack of local infrastructure (e.g. lack of local abbatoir).
Trajectories of Vulnerability: Entitlement Decline - Land
• Herders lost repeatedly land due to government regulations; (reserve policy 1923, removal from southern Kaokoland 1929, removal from Kunene River 1940s, Etosha Park 1960s, redrawing of regional boundaries 1992, hydro-electric dam site?)
• Communal Land Tenure Reform adds to uncertainty but also holds potential for more decentralised decision-making at regional level;
Emergence of Conservancies, Institution of water-Point Committees, Introduction of Land-Board 2003
NDT – MET
IRDNC – MET
NNF, Rise – MET
(
NDF – MET, Nyae Nyae Dev.
IRDNC – MET
(
RISE – MET
RISE– MET
Source:
Nacso
The uncertainfuture of landrights:community basednatural resource management
„The Great Dream: to create an unbroken conservation zone stretching from Lake Victoria to South Africa“ (SAFRI 2002:53)
The uncertain future of land rights: large scale transboundary parks
Trajectories of Vulnerability: Drought
Fig. Climatic Variation, Kamanjab 1941 - 2001
40,6
106,2
-50,1
65,479,6
-48,9
78,9
-28,7
3347,7
-27,9-43,3
-2,2
-45,7
52,5
2,4
-54,1-61,7
-42,7
31,4
75,1
-
-76,4
-45,2
-100
-50
0
50
100
150
41 44 47 50 53 56 59 62 65 68 71 74 77 80 83 86 89 92 95 98
Percentageof Deviationfrom Annual
Average
Drought is frequent in NW Namibia, minus 20% of precipitation results in about minus 80% of biomass-production in grass layer; Unclear how decadal drought affects plant communities!
Trajectories of Vulnerability: Drought
Fig. Losses of Cattle in 34 Households
-8,8-7,7
9,7
6,4
-10,8
6,5
-5,8-6,9
-13,2
9,7
-8,8
10,5
7,7
-9,7
-15
-10
-5
0
5
10
15
households
% of deviation
from meanloss of 14.5%
The Origin and Treatment of Disasters in Himba Worldview
Kinshipsolidarity
Patronage
Wealth andSocial Order
Transgression of Norms and Valuesand the Ancestral CodeMajor Disasters
Neither caused byDivine Being nor
by AncestorsMinor Household Centered
Problems and Individual MischiefCaused by Ancestors
Perception of disaster as aproblem of the kin group
Analysis of ancestral relations and possible transgressionsand recreation of harmony of ancestors and living in ritual
no further analysisand no further
treatment
The Perception of Hazards & Vulnerability:
Alternative views have become prominent: churches, development agencies, political parties diseminate different views on the causation of hazards.
The Perception of Hazards & Vulnerability
• No clear-cut relation between general frames of interpretation on the perception of specific disasters: perceptions are connected to the physical properties of hazards as to more general worldviews and the specific social and cultural embeddedness of individuals.
• Population pressure was only rated as a problem of outsiders immigrating into the region;
• Detailed local knowledge on vegetational change. However: Degradation is attributed to rainfall decline but not to increase in stock-numbers.
• The loss and denial of exchange entitlements rated as the most serious impediment to economic development.
Strategies of Risk Minimization - Management of an acute crisis
• Local Level: Higher Level:• Increased Slaughter Drought Aid• Intensive Food-Sharing Supp. Food Livestock• Substituting Food• Increased Mobility • Increased Sales• Ritual
The choice of specific strategies
at local level depend on household assets, labour availability, previous accumulation of economic, social and symbolic capital
In drought years
(1) nomadic moves are more frequent (2) grazing reserves are used (3) extra-territorial migrations are carried out
Case studyPastoral nomadism
Grazing orbit
Rainy season settl.
Move to dry season pasture
10 km
Strategies of Risk Minimization - Increasing Resilience
• Diversification
• Social Networks
• Protection of Key Resources
• These „buffering mechanisms“ are anchored socially and culturally. Common denominator: short term benefits are given up for medium and/or long term benefits.
• Resilience is a socially generated collective good!
Increasing Resilience: Diversification
Fig. The Growth and Decline of Cattle, Goats and Sheep Herds
0
100.000
200.000
300.000
400.000
500.000
Cattle
Goats
Sheep
Fig. The Himba Network
Increasing Resilience: Social Networks
c. 30% of livestock production invested into social networks
High degree of cohesiveness
Network dominated by few central actors
Increasing Resilience: Protection of Key Resources
• There is a clearly defined group of users which qualifies for the exploitation of a resource.
• Himba and Herero herders have well spelt out set of rules of „good grazing“
• Councils channel internal decision making on resource use. • Local bigmen take on the cost of sanctioning.• Local systems of resource management have been tolerated
by the state.• Danger: Local elites may usurp exclusive land-titles under
new legislation.