5.1 Summary
5.1.1 Gender and the Division of Labour
The results of the study corroborate those of other studies on gender division of labour, namely, that women’s roles revolve around the homestead while those of men feature outside the house. However, Turkana women’s roles go beyond the homestead to include roles in livestock production and cultural activities. A look at home management roles revealed that women’s roles involved food preparation, collection of water and firewood, constructing and cleaning of the homestead, and giving birth and nurturing of children. Men on the other hand, being household heads, provide food, security and other resources for the household; make decisions; and perform supervisory roles. A quick observation here is the fact that women’s roles are more energy and time consuming.
Gender roles in livestock production, which forms the backbone of the pastoralist economy, take a similar trend with women and men performing livestock production duties equally. It is the women’s responsibility to water the livestock; prepare the family items for migration; milk; herd small stock; care for the weak, sick and pregnant animals; and process hides and skins. Men are involved in herding; providing health facilities; making decisions on where to migrate, which animals to slaughter, etc.; and providing security during migration. It is important to note that when left at the camp sites while men migrate, women perform all of the traditionally male tasks by controlling the herds and exercising certain levels of pastoral government.
Both men and women were noted to play important roles in cultural activities upon which the Turkana community depends for continuity by recreating those cultural conditions that maintain the social relations of production. Women in this respect give birth and nurture children by socializing young girls into mature adults. Some also provide specialized skills like midwifery. During rituals like marriages, deaths and naming ceremonies, women prepare food and sing to keep the occasions lively. In cultural production, in addition to being custodians of cultural values, men socialize young boys into adult roles as well as organize and attend family meetings.
The foregoing discussion yields important facts to dispute the old stereotype that men in patriarchal pastoralist communities carry out more significant roles (herding and migration) than women. The study has revealed that women, in addition to performing their household chores, play a significant role in livestock production. For example, women’s role as milk managers is crucial in determining herd viability by balancing calf mortality. Furthermore, the controlling in the distribution of milk between animals and humans and the determination of the drop in milk production by animals which is an indicator of animal illness and thus animals’ health contributes greatly to the pastoral enterprise.
5.1.2 The Impact of Drought on Gender Roles
As the drought continues to worsen, pasture is degraded and the water sources dry up; both men and women find it challenging to perform their roles because of the extra time and energy spent. The water collection process in the case of women is strenuous, tedious and dangerous in view of the long distances to the water point in the wee hours of the morning, the many trips they make to obtain enough water for use and the process of scooping wells. The performance of tasks like collection of firewood and construction of houses takes a similar trend.
While men face similar challenges in the process of providing pasture and water for their animals, their greatest challenge in performing their gender roles is the continual reduction in their capacity as breadwinners because of lack of resources. This role is further affected by the fact that women control the relief food provided by the charitable organizations in the region. The increased role of women in food provision, gives them more autonomy in the family – a fact that threatens men’s authority within the household. Women’s autonomy in decision-making was further enhanced by their experience in running the households when left at camp sites during migration.
A look at men’s and women’s roles in cultural reproduction has revealed that women have less time left to socialize young children and girls into the ways of the community because most of their time is spent on the search for and preparation of food. Similarly, their role in participating in rituals and ceremonies which heavily depends on the slaughter of animals (that are no longer available) is reduced because these occasions rarely take place during the dry period. Unlike women, men have extra time to spend in socializing young boys into young adults by showing them roots and grazing. However, their participation in kinship-related roles is affected because most people are away or too busy trying to make ends meet to spare time for such social encounters.
5.1.3 Gender Desegregated Adaptive Strategies
The results of the study show that both men and women living in the drought-stricken Turkana District have over the years devised a number of adaptive strategies using their individual skills and opportunities to enhance their families’ well being during drought. The adaptive strategies identified by the study include:
• Pastoral supportive activities: These activities depend on the physical environment and individual skills. People living on the shores of Lake Turkana have taken on fishing while those near the Turkwell River plant maize and sorghum, sukuma with fruits such as oranges, mangoes and bananas. The study has revealed that adaptation to these new skills is quite challenging especially for fishing in view of the improper equipment used.
• Migration: This was the most common way of dealing with drought cited by the respondents. Migration takes different forms that include movement either as a whole family, part of a family or individuals as determined by the intensity of the drought. Whole families moved at the beginning of drought to new richer locations and later when the drought intensified, only the younger men moved to access greener pastures or formal employment in towns. Similarly, the specific purpose of migrating determined the migration locations, with those looking for casual and permanent jobs moving to urban centres while those in search of pasture and water moving to highlands like Lotere and Pelekech. Migration is dominated by men since women remain in the homesteads to look after the households. Fishermen along Lake Turkana also migrate to follow the patterns of fish movement.
• Improvising by use of locally available materials: Animal feeds are obtained from the skin of wild fruits (dumb palm) and maize and sorghum stalks in the case of Turkwell residents. Similarly, traditional herbs are used in water purification and veterinary purposes. The improvisation process was observed to be the domain of women as was the case of the use of dumb palm leaves in weaving of mats, hats and baskets for sale.
• Herd/stock splitting: This is done by men to maximize the use of the limited animal pasture.
• Mechanisms to obtain and conserve water: Women used the following ways to obtain water: migrating to water points; using carts and bicycles to transport water; and buying and storing water. Conversation mechanisms mainly involved reduction in water usage even for drinking purposes by reducing the number of baths taken and times of washing utensils.
• Dependence on charitable organization/institutions: Both men and women depended on schools, NGOs, churches, and children’s homes to obtain food in form of relief food and lunch, shelter and feeds for their families especially children.
• Relying on wild fruits and seeds to supplement food sources.
• Formation of women/youth groups to organize economic activities to generate cash for family use.
• Use of food preservation methods: Women preserve foods (that last up to one year) to prolong their usage by drying, frying and boiling.
• Economic activities: The kind of economic activity engaged in was influenced by social factors like gender and economic status of the family individuals that provided the income to buy provisions. Women dominated home-related activities like sale of food snacks, carvings, firewood, fetching water, weaving items and working as housemaids. Men do herd-related activities like buying and selling of cows, carpentry, construction work, long distance hawking of veterinary medicines and sheets, providing security during migration, fishing and selling tobacco, salt, and sugarcane. Both men and women engage in the sale of water, operation of kiosks and weaving.
5.1.4 Factors that Interact with Gender to Influence the Coping Strategies
The study has revealed that gender interacts with other socio-economic factors in determining how residents of Turkana District cope with drought. The following factors were identified:
Social networks: The social networks established previously or during the drought were more effective at the onset of drought and their effectiveness diminished as the drought worsened. Social networks took the form of relatives especially in-laws, peer friends and associations with non-governmental organisations and schools. Such networks provide food, care of children and old people, medical assistance, school fees, cash and connections to employment. Similarly, they provide moral support to those concerned and especially so to those belonging to women/youth organizations and age-sets in the case of men.
Socio-economic status: The socio-economic status among the Turkana is mainly determined by the number of stock owned. Normally, it is the cows that count; however, since these are killed by drought, the goats which survive drought better determine the socio-economic status because they can be slaughtered for food, for a visitor or for a ceremony or sold to obtain food. The larger the stock a family has the better the risk management during drought. Although women own animals among the Turkana, they have no rights over their slaughter or sale; thus, their ability to cope with drought is reduced. Consequently, they engage like men in small businesses and formal or casual employment. It was, however, noted that some women hire the services of other not well-to-do women to perform their daily chores, a fact that highlights the interaction of gender and socio-economic status.
Proximity to urban centres: Proximity to urban centres (Lodwar, Kalokol and Turkwell) has numerous benefits including access to social amenities such as water and medical services, food brought in from other more productive regions, assistance from charitable organisations, casual and permanent jobs and market for businesses. Proximity to urban centres also has gender implications because it was mostly men who migrated to these centres although a few women ventured into towns to work as housemaids.
Proximity to the lake: Proximity to Lake Turkana has various advantages including fishing which is a male domain, (women do the fish processing) market for businesses and materials for weaving and trees for firewood, which is of great importance to women activities.
Polygamy: Polygamy, which is a widely practiced family arrangement among the Turkana, is advantageous because it is a labour-intensive mechanism. However, this benefit is only felt at the on-set of drought. When the drought worsens, it becomes strenuous to provide for large families. This is quite challenging especially for women because each individual household (under the women) has to operate independently. To cope with the tight situations, some women opt to go back to their homes until the drought dies down.
5.2 Conclusions
The study results reaffirm the crucial role played by pastoralist women in maintaining pastoral societies and dispute the old stereotype that men tend to play a more important role. This fact is supported by the gender division of labour analysis done to highlight the fact that, in addition to performing their gender roles of child nurturing, milking livestock, constructing houses, women play the crucial role of cultural reproduction in socializing children and especially girls and participating in rituals and cultural ceremonies. However, in view of the numerous and taxing roles played by women, the performance of these roles becomes even more challenging in the drought situation when basic resources are scarce.
The adaptive strategies employed by Turkana District residents to cope with the drought were based on gender knowledge and skills acquired over the years from living in the drought-stricken district. For example, great innovativeness was noted in the extensive usage of egol (dumb palm tree) during the drought season. This plant, in addition to its use as a protein source for humans, is also used as animal feed and for water purification.
The study has identified gender as the main determinant of how well the residents coped with drought. Gender was, however, complemented by factors such as proximity to urban centres and the lake, socio-economic status, polygamy and social networks.
5.3 Recommendations
In view of the fact that famine relief plays an important role in alleviating the effects of drought, this programme should be enhanced to cater for more people. In addition, the distribution centres should be moved closer to the residents.
Non-governmental organizations interested in assisting Turkana District improve its status should target pastoral support activity projects such as fishing by supplying modern fishing equipment and agriculture by enhancing irrigation for those living along Turkwell River. The focus should be on long-term projects that can help sustain food security among pastoralist communities
Since economic activities play a crucial role in alleviating the effects of drought, the government and non-governmental organizations should assist residents, especially women, access loans and improve roads that limit commercial activity within the region. Specifically, the following are recommended:
i) The Ministry of Science and Technology and related non-governmental organizations should study and utilize the innovative food preservation and water purification methods used by women in the district to apply their usage to other famine-stricken districts in the country.
ii) The National Food Policy should be re-visited so that the available food is equitably distributed to reach marginalized drought-affected regions like Turkana.
iii) Due to lack of water in drought seasons, diseases related to poor hygiene practices can be very common especially among children. There is, therefore, need for adequate supply of medical facilities to the area.
Further research should be done on the various income-generating activities that pastoral men and women in Turkana District engage in to establish their advantages and disadvantages, and reasons for their success or failure to establish the kind of support residents require.
A study should be conducted to document information on the socialization roles played by both men and women in cultural reproduction among the Turkana community since socialization plays a crucial role in cultural transmission.
