The Dryland Husbandry Project (DHP) is an effort to bring together a variety of stakeholders in pastoral development, to identify and develop strategies for addressing the crisis of African drylands in the nineties. A network approach will be used to raise issues of mutual concern to researchers, practitioners and, above all, pastoralists, with particular emphasis on sustainable service provision and water management. For further details of the research project see the back page.
The Regional Office of DHP, OSSREA has taken the initiative to launch a DHP Publications Series for the Dryland Husbandry Project with the view to exchange and share opinions and experiences on issues of dryland husbandry in the Horn of Africa Sub-region in general and in the DHP areas in particular. The DHP Publications Series is a forum where researchers in the Dryland Husbandry Project and others inform the research and academic community, the policy makers and interested individuals and institutions the results of their action-oriented and participatory research, our training, workshop findings, trials research, ethno-veterinary practices, the relevance and use of indigenous knowledge in the project areas.
This is the first issue of the Dryland Husbandry Project (DHP) Publications Series. In this issue, we have selected and put together papers that were presented at the National Workshop on Dryland Husbandry in the Sudan. The workshop was held at the University of Khartoum in November 1995. These papers, OSSREA believes, could provide the reader information on the status of knowledge on dryland husbandry in the Sudan. This publication could also serve to encourage people with interest to do more with people in the pastoral and agro-pastoral areas in the Sudan. It is our strong believe that in order to understand and to be on top of the problems in the dryland areas in the Sudan, more attention and collaborative work both by researchers and policy makers together with the people at the grassroots is indeed a priority.
Tegegne Teka, Editor
1. Background to the Workshop
Sudan is the largest IGAD member state, with a land area of approximately 2.5 million square kms. Its population is approximately 26 million, 75% of whom live in rural areas. The economy depends predominantly on agriculture which contributes about 30% of the GDP.
Two-thirds of the area of the Sudan is arid or semi-desert. Recurrent droughts have rendered many pastoralists and small scale cultivators in these areas vulnerable to famine and impoverishment. However, the causes of the present crisis in the rural production systems in the country cannot be attributed to drought and desertification alone. Misguided economic policies have played an important role in the deteriorating situation of the population.
Breaking the vicious circle of the ecological stress and the increasing vulnerability of the population of the drylands require an increased production from small-scale cultivation and livestock husbandry. Training and research are needed to re-orient development planning in a new direction that considers interaction among local communities, researchers, extensionists, planners and decision-makers.
One of the major problems of livestock production is the deterioration of range resources. Range rehabilitation and desertification control strategy in the Sudan are based on an ecological approach whereby the corrective measures are chosen to correspond to the environmental conditions which prevail in a specific ecosystem. Pilot demonstration measures are expected to contribute to the rehabilitation and improvement of the grazing resources.
In order to provide successful models for rehabilitation and management of drylands, two typical areas representing the drylands of the Sudan are selected for the activities of this project. The first area is in Northern Kordofan (El Khuwei), situated within the semi-desert zone and whose population, beside practising traditional rainfed farming, also keep various types of livestock. The main target groups of this area are the pastoralists - Hamar and Kababish tribes. They are primarily camel, goat and sheep pastoralists. Both the Hamar and Kababish adhere to a complex migration pattern which involves a cyclical movement during the dry season to the south and then northward where they spend the rainy season.
The second area is the Butana in the eastern region which is inhabited by the Shukriya tribe. Unlike the area of the Hamar and the Kababish, whose climate and sandy soils are not suitable for large scale agricultural production, the Butana's climate and soils are suitable for agricultural production. Hence, the pastoralists suffer from large-scale encroachment of both irrigated and rainfed agriculture limiting their movement to marginal areas which are over-grazed.
The present project intends to create an enabling environment for the pastoralists in both areas to maintain a balanced productive system. Hence, the project involves activities for range improvement, disease control and rehabilitation of degraded areas.
The project activities include:
1. In-service training and re-training of extension staff on social dimension of range management.
2. Training of veterinary scouts.
3. Training of pastoralists.
4. Intervention and action research which will focus on indigenous grasses and tree species as well as socio-economic aspects of pastoral production.
In order to launch the activities of the project, this workshop on "Dryland Husbandry in the Sudan" provides a quick review of the status of knowledge and highlight the level of previous research and activities in the selected areas. Hence, the workshop is held with the following objectives.
2. Objectives of the Workshop
1. Provide a background on dryland studies in the Sudan with special emphasis on pastoral communities.
2. Provide the participants with a background on regional and international experiences and research in drylands.
3. Discuss types of research needed on Sudan's drylands and pastoral communities with emphasis on the selected areas.
4. Discuss project activities and recommend improvements.
3. Organization of the Workshop
The National Steering Committee formed a task force of three persons to prepare for the workshop. Their task included the selection of relevant papers to be presented, persons and institutions to be invited and the selection of an appropriate venue. The task force, guided by the National Steering Committee and taking into consideration the objectives of the workshop, contacted appropriate persons and institutions to prepare both background papers and to participate in the workshop (See Annex I).
4. The Workshop
Invitations were sent to more than 30 institutions with interests in dryland husbandry (Annex II). Selected individuals were also invited. The Minister of Agriculture, Natural Resources and Animal Wealth attended the opening session and addressed the participants. Abstracts of papers - more than 200 sets - were distributed to all participants. The workshop was well attended and participants actively contributed to the discussions. The last session, which was devoted to a discussion of future programmes, with emphasis on the present project, yielded a wide range of relevant recommendations to be considered by the National Steering Committee.
5. Recommendations
The recommendations may be divided into two groups. The first group are those pertaining to the project activities and the second are those of general nature related to aspects deemed necessary for proper dryland husbandry.
The participants recommended specific research problems to be investigated in the selected areas. The most important are summarized in the following:
Research on indigenous knowledge to cover traditional ways of fodder storage and preservation; indigenous ways of solving conflicts; indigenous ways of range management; indigenous institutions and their role in range management and indigenous classification of plants.
Research on economics of rangelands.
Research on new emerging patterns of pastoralism.
Policies.
How to activate pastoral associations.
Research on seasonal variations in productivity.
Role of pastoral women.
Taxonomy.
Range improvement and management through the involvement of pastoralists.
Re-introduction of "Ahmia".
Introduction of improved breeds.
Disease control through training of veterinary scouts.
Water harvesting to improve range utilization.
Training of pastoralists to be veterinary scouts.
Training of extension agents (veterinary and range specialists) on pastoral systems and social behaviour and on how to make use of the pastoralists traditional knowledge.
Training on the use of appropriate technology, e.g. water harvesting, simple methods of re-seeding, and on methods to improve animal products.
Need for a land use map.
Studies on land tenure.
Studies on rangelands laws.
Assessment of the potentials of natural resources and recommendations on use according to capability.
Collection and review of previous studies on pastoralism to identify gaps in knowledge.
Repeat of monitoring studies to assess degree of recovery and assessment of biomass productivity.
Establishment of a national herbarium.
Better coordination among institutions working in dryland husbandry.
