A moving “city’ of 10,000 cows and over 300 mainly young Jei warrior nomads who usually drive their herds across a 27,000 square mile area may be forced to settle. The reason behind this is because of harsh weather. More than 190 countries are preparing to meet in Durban, South Africa, to discuss UN climate changes — though none of the 20 million nomadic herders will be directly represented.
If temperatures rise and droughts intensify in Africa’s dry lands, their animals will be at greater risk, and conventional farming across vast areas could will become impossible. Climate change threatens the traditional life ways of Uganda’s semi-nomadic people.
The EU has given Uganda 3.9 million shillings, or approximately $1.5 million US dollars, to fund a three-year development program in Karamoja, with nearly all the money intended to make the nomads settle. Orumoi Evans said, “I have only 10 cows now and its not enough. We sell them to pay for schooling, shelter. They are life to us. Now I have to grow maize and vegetables. But pastoralism is more secure than cultivating. You cannot rely on the weather for growing food, but we do know where to go to find pasture.”
Actual Title: Uganda: nomads face an attack on their way of life
Source: The Guardian (UK)
Date: November 26, 2011
Author: John Vidal
URL: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/nov/27/uganda-nomad-farmers-climate-change
Student Researcher: Tommy Porter, Sonoma State University
Faculty Evaluator: Edie Brown, Sonoma State University