Pastoralism and wildlife: historical and current perspectives in the East African rangelands of Kenya and Tanzania

Lankester, Felix; Davis, Alicia

doi:10.20506/rst.35.2.2536

Cited by 23 publications

(31 citation statements)

References 48 publications

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“…It has deep cultural and social traditions harbouring key concepts and institutions for governance and social organisation, knowledge management, and transformation. The environmental benefits of pastoralism are highlighted as Seid Mohammed Ali shows the contribution pastoralism makes to environmental services (23), Brigitte Kaufmann et al describe pastoral livestock genetic resources and biodiversity (24), Bilal Butt addresses the issues of rangeland dynamics and management (25), and Felix Lankester and Alicia Davis discuss pastoral land use and wildlife (26).…”

Section: Opportunitiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The future of pastoralism: an introduction

Zinsstag¹,

Schelling²,

Bonfoh³

et al. 2016

Rev. Sci. Tech. OIE

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Two-thirds of the agricultural land on planet Earth is grassland on which no other crops can be grown, either because of limited rainfall, high altitude or mountainous conditions. Most of these semi-arid and high-altitude pastoral ecosystems are used by livestock husbandry systems with various forms of mobility and are not in competition with crop production for human nutrition. By devoting an issue of its Scientific and Technical Review to pastoralism, the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) is encouraging debate on this important topic and helping to shape the future of pastoralists and their livestock. Pastoralism is a complex system, driven by interacting ecological, social and economic factors that cannot be adequately addressed by one discipline or sector alone. For its future development, we must engage with local knowledge systems and with all stakeholders. This issue of the OIE Review endeavours to take a broad view and provide a synthetic vision for the sustainable use of pastoral ecosystems, with innovative ideas for livelihoods, economic development, sustained ecosystem services and social and institutional development as the context for animal and human health and wellbeing.

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Section: Opportunitiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The future of pastoralism: an introduction

Zinsstag¹,

Schelling²,

Bonfoh³

et al. 2016

Rev. Sci. Tech. OIE

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show abstract

“…The copyright holder for this preprint (which this version posted April 6, 2021. ; https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.04.05.438440 doi: bioRxiv preprint are widespread features of past and current East-African landscapes (Lankester and Davis, 2016). Therefore, (H2) we expect tree-grass coexistence and agro-pastoralism to exist in a broader range of conditions than others vegetation types and socio-economic profiles, respectively (House et al, 2003;Nelson et al, 2009).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

East-African savanna dynamics: from a knowledge-based model to the possible futures of a social-ecological system

Cosme¹,

Hély

Pommereau

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Sub-Saharan savanna ecosystems are undergoing transitions such as bush encroachment, desertification or agricultural expansion. Such shifts and persistence of land cover are increasingly well understood, especially bush encroachment which is of major concern in pastoral systems. Although dominant factors can explain such transformations, they often result from intertwined causes in which human activities play a significant role. Therefore, in this latter case, these issues may require integrated solutions, involving many interacting components. Ecosystem modelling has proved appropriate to support decision-makers in such complex situations. However, ecosystem models often require lots of quantitative information for estimating parameters and the precise functional form of interactions is often unknown. Alternatively, in rangeland management, States-and-Transitions Models (STMs) have been developed to organize knowledge about system transitions and to help decision-makers. However, these conceptual diagrams often lack mathematical analyzing tools, which strongly constrains their complexity. In this paper, we introduce the Ecological Discrete-Event Network (EDEN) modelling approach for representing the qualitative dynamics of an East-African savanna as a set of discrete states and transitions generated from empirical rules. These rules are derived from local knowledge, field observations and scientific literature. In contrast with STMs, EDEN generates automatically every possible states and transitions, thus enabling the prediction of novel ecosystem structures. Our results show that the savanna is potentially resilient to the disturbances considered. Moreover, the model highlights all transitions between vegetation types and socio-economic profiles under various climatic scenarios. The model also suggests that wildlife diversity may increase socio-economic resistance to seasonal drought. Tree-grass coexistence and agropastoralism have the widest ranges of conditions of existence of all vegetation types and socio-economic profiles, respectively. As this is a preliminary use of EDEN for applied purpose, analysis tools should be improved to enable finer investigation of desirable trajectories. By translating local knowledge into ecosystem dynamics, the EDEN approach seems promising to build a new bridge between managers and modellers.

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“…These complications associated with human/wildlife coexistence raise challenges for biodiversity conservation and local development. They impact local communities' livelihoods and well-being [15][16][17][18], and threaten the sustainable coexistence between stakeholders involved in the management of these land-uses. In this context, identifying and characterizing environmental drivers that condition animal movements in space and time is essential to assess the potential opportunities and threats associated with wild/domestic interactions in PA-CL interfaces.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Remote Sensing of Environmental Drivers Influencing the Movement Ecology of Sympatric Wild and Domestic Ungulates in Semi-Arid Savannas, a Review

et al. 2020

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Interfaces between protected areas and their peripheries in southern Africa are subject to interactions between wildlife and livestock that vary in frequency and intensity. In these areas, the juxtaposition between production and conservation land uses in a context of increasing anthropisation can create issues associated with human-wildlife coexistence and raises concerns for biodiversity conservation, local development and livelihoods. This literature review aimed at addressing the need to consolidate and gather in one article current knowledge on potential uses of satellite remote sensing (SRS) products by movement ecologists to investigate the sympatry of wildlife/domestic ungulates in savanna interface environments. A keyword querying process of peer reviewed scientific paper, thesis and books has been implemented to identify references that (1) characterize the main environmental drivers impacting buffalo (Syncerus caffer caffer) and cattle (Bos taurus & Bos indicus) movements in southern Africa environments, (2) describe the SRS contribution to discriminate and characterize these drivers. In total, 327 references have been selected and analyzed. Surface water, precipitation, landcover and fire emerged as key drivers impacting the buffalo and cattle movements. These environmental drivers can be efficiently characterized by SRS, mainly through open-access SRS products and standard image processing methods. Applying SRS to better understand buffalo and cattle movements in semi-arid environments provides an operational framework that could be replicated in other type of interface where different wild and domestic species interact. There is, however, a need for animal movement ecologists to reinforce their knowledge of remote sensing and/or to increase pluridisciplinary collaborations.

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Pastoralism and wildlife: historical and current perspectives in the East African rangelands of Kenya and Tanzania

Cited by 23 publications

References 48 publications

The future of pastoralism: an introduction

The future of pastoralism: an introduction

East-African savanna dynamics: from a knowledge-based model to the possible futures of a social-ecological system

Remote Sensing of Environmental Drivers Influencing the Movement Ecology of Sympatric Wild and Domestic Ungulates in Semi-Arid Savannas, a Review

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