UN OCHA Pastoralist Communication Initiative (PCI) yesterday launched a groundbreaking report on pastoralism in Ethiopia

'The Future of Pastoralism in Ethiopia' is a summary of the work of Ethiopian government officials, representatives from traditional institutions and scholars from around the world who met at the University of Sussex, Brighton, England in December to examine key factors affecting pastoralism in Ethiopia. The report offers fresh insight into how pastoralist communities are moving into the future in a country with over 60 percent semi-arid lowlands and the highest population of livestock in Africa.

The Brighton meetings, facilitated by UN OCHA-PCI and the Institute of Development Studies (IDS), also brought together academic scholars from Canada, USA, UK, France and Kenya to provide evidence to the Ethiopian team. Participants heard and discussed evidence from these leading thinkers on influential longer-term factors that affect development in pastoralist regions and analysed how these might combine to shape the future, envisioning some of the choices pastoralists may make over the next 20 years.

"Opening up debates about pastoralism in Africa is a vitally important challenge. Driven by Ethiopian concerns, this process of looking into the future allowed this 'opening up' to happen in exciting ways", said Professor Ian Scoones, chief facilitator of the meeting for IDS.

The meetings examined such key factors affecting pastoralist communities as the role of key environmental resources, questions of export and national market access for pastoralists and the need to promote conflict resolution and other governance measures.

For further information or a copy of the booklet, please email UN OCHA-PCI at info@unocha-pci.org or contact: Alastair Scott-Villiers +251 (0)115 539999