NOTES ON MURSI SUBSISTENCE
AND METHODS OF PUBLIC DECISION MAKING
David Turton
Senior Associate, Department of International Development and former Director, Refugee Studies Centre, University of Oxford
These notes were sent (unsolicited) to African Parks Foundation (APF),
as two separate documents, in May and August 2005 respectively. The aim
was to help APF staff understand the complex seasonal movements of the
Mursi, and to consult them in a culturally appropriate way.
Mursi dependence on natural resources within the Omo and Mago National Parks
The Mursi make use of agricultural land along both banks of the River
Omo (in the Omo National Park) and in the upper Mago Valley (in the
Mago National Park). They also make use of grazing land in the Elma
Valley, which also lies within the Mago National Park.
Those trying to improve conditions for local people in this area,
whether government officials or development planners, have rarely taken
the trouble to understand the economic and environmental logic of local
systems of natural resource management. Instead they have tended to
believe whatever was most convenient for the administrative or
development objectives they had in mind. For administrators, the image
has been of people wandering around aimlessly, ‘hanging onto the
tails of their cattle’. For development planners and advisers,
the (equally unfounded) image has been of local people destroying their
own environment through the use of ‘traditional’ methods of
agricultural and pastoral production.
The Mursi depend on three main subsistence activities: flood retreat
cultivation, rain-fed cultivation and cattle herding. Cultivation
accounts for at least 75 per cent of their diet while cattle, apart
from being an important source of milk (especially for children) and
meat, are a vital standby at times of crop failure, when they can be
exchanged for grain in the highlands. Because of their relatively low
cattle numbers, the low and unpredictable local rainfall and the wide
annual fluctuation in the level of the Omo flood, the Mursi must
integrate all three of these sources of subsistence by means of a
complex cycle of seasonal movements. This mix of subsistence
activities, and the seasonal dispersal of people and cattle it depends
on, has been the main condition both of Mursi survival and of the
sustainable use of renewable resources in this area.
Planting begins at the Omo in October, as the flood recedes, and the
harvest comes in December and January. This is the most valuable
agricultural land the Mursi possess, since its fertility is annually
renewed by the silt carried in the flood water. The main crop is
sorghum, of which the Mursi possess many drought resistant varieties.
Areas liable to flood lie on both banks of the river, depending on the
curvature of its meanders. Between October and February, when the bulk
of the population is at the Omo, the cattle are kept in the wooded
grasslands which rise towards the Omo-Mago watershed. The Elma valley
is particularly important at this time, because it is relatively free
from tsetse flies and water can usually be found at various points,
even at the height of the dry season.
If denied access to the Omo banks and the Elma Valley, the Mursi would
be confined to the wedge of territory lying between the Omo and Mago
Parks. This would reduce their subsistence base by at least 50 per cent
and make them permanently dependent on food aid. There being no
permanent water sources in this area, for either cattle or humans,
boreholes would have to be drilled. With thousands of cattle
concentrated around these boreholes, overgrazing would quickly result
in an environmental disaster.
The Lower Omo Valley is an area of high biological diversity because
of, not despite, thousands of years of human use and occupation,
including the interaction of wild and domestic animals. The fact
that it can be mistaken today (e.g. by tour operators) for a
‘wilderness’ is a tribute to the benign environmental
impact of local natural resource management practices. Human
activity has not (so far) destroyed this environment. It would be a
tragic irony, but one not without precedent, if it were destroyed in
the name of conservation.
Consulting the Mursi
The standard method used by government officials to communicate with
the Mursi on important policy matters is to bring a group of
‘elders’ together from different parts of the
country, tell them what the government has decided to do and
explain why this is in their best interests. These meetings are usually
held in the zonal or wereda capital. There are two problems with this
as a method of consulting local people and gaining their trust and
cooperation.
First, who is an ‘elder’? The word is best applied to a man
of a certain ‘social’ age – in particular, a member
of the bara age grade. Some bara are more politically ambitious
than others, and these will be more active in public life. Some are
also more highly regarded than others, for their
‘statesmanlike’ qualities and oratorical skills. But none
have the right to make decisions for the community as a whole. The
Mursi do not have elected representatives or hereditary chiefs.
Decisions are made at meetings of all adult men of the local community,
at which the pros and cons of a particular course of action are
debated. Second, meetings to which ‘elders’ are
summoned to hear about government plans and policies tend to be
conducted not only on the government’s own ground but also on the
government’s own terms. Not surprisingly, the Mursi have come to
regard such ‘top-down’ meetings, so different from their
own methods of political decision making, with scepticism or simply
indifference.
Ideally then, APF would consult the Mursi, from the start,
on their own ground, and by using their own procedures for reaching
consensus about issues that concern communities as a whole. This would
mean attending public meetings in at least three of the major
territorial divisions (buranyoga) of Mursiland – e.g. at Maganto
for Baruba, at Ma’do for Biogolokare and Mugjo and at Kurum for
Ariholi and Gongulobibi. These meetings would be hosted by the local
communities in question and would be called specifically to enable APF
to lay out its aims and objectives and to listen and respond to local
views, opinions and concerns. Above all, it would mean APF being
prepared to negotiate compromises – to adjust its plans in
accordance with the interests, needs and concerns expressed by a
consensus of local opinion.
Attending meetings of this kind would be hard work, time consuming and
physically uncomfortable. But the effort would be worth while, because
it would help to persuade the Mursi that APF really means what it says,
when it talks of local people as ‘collaborators’ in its
project. It would show that APF was taking their views and
concerns seriously; that it saw itself as a guest in their country; and
that it recognised their right to participate in its planning
processes. It would also help APF staff to understand the highly
organised and democratic methods of public discussion and decision
making of the Mursi, an understanding they would undoubtedly find
valuable in their future dealings with local communities. Above
all, it would mean that any decisions and agreements resulting from
such meetings could genuinely be represented as having the backing of
the community as a whole.
Although it is necessary - for effective communication as well as to
gain the trust of local people - to make use of local
decision making institutions, I’m not saying that these
institutions are in all respects beneficial to all members of the
society. In particular, women do not have a public voice in political
decision making amongst the Mursi. APF will therefore have to find ways
of listening to women’s views, perhaps by holding separate
meetings, attended by women only. Apart from considerations of gender
equality, women are the people who are chiefly responsible for
agricultural production, which provides the main component of the diet
of most people. Their knowledge of, and views about, agricultural land
lying within the Omo Park (i.e., along both banks of the Omo) therefore
need to be understood and taken into account.
17/5/06