Migration of Pastoralists in Africa: Reflections on Practical and Policy Implications
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.14426/ahmr.v5i2.885Keywords:
Cross-border transhumance, ECOWAS protocols, Migration, Pastoralism, Pastoral conflictAbstract
In recent years, there has been increased migration of pastoralists from
countries in Central and West Africa into Nigeria. Such movements are
supported by the ECOWAS Transhumance Protocol and the Nigerian
Constitution respectively. The movement of pastoralists has been associated with
multi-dimensional practical and policy implications. This paper reflects on the
policy implications of the migration of pastoralists across and within the borders
of Nigeria and presents pointers to the areas for future policy intervention and
research. The paper relied on existing policies like the ECOWAS Transhumance
Protocol, the Nigerian Constitution and the Open Grazing Prohibition Law
enacted by the Benue State government to draw inferences about the relevance
and effectiveness of such laws in Nigeria. Interviews with farmers and
pastoralists were conducted in 2017 to augment the policy analysis. The paper
reports that the provisions of the ECOWAS Transhumance Protocol, like the
possession of the International Transhumance Certificate as a mandatory entry
requirement, have not been implemented in Nigeria.
Downloads
Issue
Section
License
Articles and reviews in AHMR reflect the opinions of the contributors. AHMR allows the author/s to retain full copyright in their articles. This is an open access journal which means that all content is freely available without charge to the user or his/her institution. Articles are made available under a Creative Commons license (CC-BY-4.0). Authors who have published under a CC BY 4.0 licence may share and distribute their article on commercial and non-commercial websites and repositories of their choice. Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author/s provided the author/s is correctly attributed. This is in accordance with the BOAI definition of open access.
