In the past cattle raiding in Africa was mainly a survival response, taking place when disease and famine struck a community. However, due to regional climate changes and current social and economic developments such raids are now turning more and more into violent conflicts. The conference "Climate change and security in Africa", that took place in January in Paris, shed some light on the current situation of pastoral communities in different parts of Africa, in the context of changing weather patterns. The conference – jointly organized by CEAN, CERI, ACTED and the Egmont Institute – aimed at stimulating a critical reflection on the complex relationship between climate change and security in Africa.

Land degradation is becoming worse in severity and extent, thus increasing the need for cattle raiding in order to restock depleted livestock. However, this is not the only reason for more frequent violence. Raiders are using increasingly sophisticated weapons such as machine guns, which not only results in more violent conflicts but makes drought management activities a much greater challenge for development organisations like ACTED. Another important aspect, brought up during the conference discussions, is that as a result of climate change local communities find it increasingly difficult to preserve the cultural heritage and traditional knowledge that have for centuries informed adaptation strategies. This trend is visible in the erosion of the time-honoured leadership of elders. Traditionally a factor of local stability, the elders’ knowledge becomes less effective as a means to cope with the challenges of extreme weather. This, in turn, leads to decreasing respect in the younger generation and to an accelerated disintegration of local communities. As outlined by an EU representative, all these trends are important issues for EU-Africa relations. From his perspective the implementation of the EU-Africa strategy, announced in November 2007, can function as an instrument to address the cross-cutting problems of climate change and security. To this end, however, the conference clearly showed that the strategy also needs to take into consideration the complex web of issues at the local level. (Dennis Taenzler)



For more information on the joint conference of the Egmont Royal Institute for International Relations, Agency for Technical Cooperation and Development (ACTED), Centre d’études et de recherches internationales (CERI) und Centre d’études d’Afrique Noire (Sciences po Bordeaux) (CEAN), please see

http://www.acted.org/2009/01/19/conference-on-security-and-climate-change-in-africa-january-20th-2009/


For more information on the situation of pastoralist communities in East Africa, please see the Oxfam Briefing Paper "Survival of the fittest" at http://www.oxfam.org/policy/bp116-pastoralism-climate-change-0808

Published in:ECC-Newsletter, February 2009