The landscape is our ancestral home. It defines us. Landscape, livelihood, and community are deeply connected.Mali Ole Kaunga
The Pastoralist Lifestyle
Pastoralists lead a semi-nomadic lifestyle, moving their family home base, or “enkang,” three times a year to support their herds of cattle, goats, and sheep. On average, these herds are moved 40 kilometers each day. Traveling lightly, they rely on milk from their animals and carry essentials like rice, grains, flour, cabbage, or kale, cooking with fire.
Their animals play a crucial role in the ecosystem, tilling and fertilizing the soil, creating biodiversity hotspots, and sequestering carbon as they move across the land.
Tradition Meets Technology
Pastoralists also seamlessly blend traditional practices with modern technology. They use smartphones to track weather, integrate meteorological science with ancestral knowledge, stay connected with family, and monitor market prices for their animals.
Overcoming Adversity
Despite their sustainable practices, fencing, land fragmentation, and increasing climate crisis impacts sometimes force pastoralists to move their herds up to 500 kilometers using track and rail, diminishing the benefits of their traditional way of life. Increasingly severe droughts are also causing them to travel further for both grazing and water.
Home Planet Fund supports pastoralist communities in Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda. Their efforts include securing land rights for future generations and increasing women’s inclusion in decision-making processes.
Meshack Lenaisimol from Samburu County, Kenya, aptly summarizes their mission:
It’s important to care for the wild and the forests. Indigenous people have always cared for the land and know how to heal it, especially during climate change.Meshack Lenaisimol
By supporting pastoralist communities, we can help preserve their invaluable contributions to our planet.
