Learning to Survive Ecological Risks among the Sidama of Southwestern Ethiopia

Sidama farmers rely on rain-fed agriculture and experience a highly variable natural environment. Recurrent drought, erratic rainfall, and crop and livestock loss are common in midand lowland areas, but local people are not passive victims of the changing environment--they use accumulated knowledge and skills to respond to and buffer ecological changes. Based on freelists and in-depth interviews with 70 adults and 50 adolescents, this paper describes how the Sidama conceive of ecological risks, survive difficult times, and learn to be resilient. The results indicate that food shortage and drought are salient risk factors. While local people think the future is unpredictable, they have diverse and complex knowledge about saving, trading and farming that help them cope with environmental challenges. Fifty adolescents interviewed reported that they learned diverse survival strategies from parents, fellow adolescents, and other adults. Interviews with adolescents and adults indicate that the Sidama use multiple methods, including teaching, to transmit cultural knowledge and skills about how to survive ecological risks. Ecologists Berkes and Jolly (2002) and anthropologists Moran (2006:13-15) and Nazarea (2006) argue that local people are not passive victims of ecological uncertainty--they have a philosophy and accumulated knowledge acquired through generations by cultural transmission to help them understand environmental variability and survive difficult times. This paper examines how Sidama farmers identify and define ecological risks and how they construct knowledge sets for survival. The paper also compares adults’ and adolescents’ risk perceptions, and examines how Articles Journal of Ecological Anthropology Vol. 18 No. 1 2016 adolescents acquire the knowledge that prepares them for future social-environmental shocks such as drought, rainfall failure, and food shortage. Data from adults and adolescents indicate that diverse forms of socially acquired knowledge and skills enable the Sidama to respond to various forms of culturally demarcated times of hardship. BACKGROUND ON THE SIDAMA The People and their Ecology The Sidama are Cushitic speakers located 270 kilometers south of Ethiopia’s capital, Addis Ababa. Sidamaland constitutes one of the administrative zones in the Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples Region (SNNPR). In 2013, the total population of the Sidama was 3,514,491 living in an area of 6,538 km2 with a population density of 536/km2 (Central Statistical Agency of Ethiopia 2013). The average household size is 4.9 persons. The majority of Sidama are smallholder agriculturalists while a few live in urban areas (8.8 percent). The Sidama population has increased dramatically in the last 30 years—more than doubling in size. The total population was 1.5 million in 1984 (Hamer 1987), 2 million in 1994, about 3 million in 2007, and 3.5 million in 2013 (CSAE 1994, 2008 and 2013). Increase in population size had a significant impact on land fragmentation, which has become a source of food insecurity and interpersonal and ethnic conflicts (Alan 2011:163; Quinlan et al. 2015). The Sidama were incorporated into the modern Ethiopian state in the 1890s, which impacted their traditional economic and socio-economic life. The Imperial administration introduced the gabar system, and the people had to pay heavy taxes to balabats (‘landlords’). The system reduced Sidama peasants to the status of tenant (Hamar 1987:132). The Derg government, which took power in 1974, abolished the gabar system and instituted land reform to redistribute the land to the peasants through government-established peasant associations. The state held land-ownership rights, and the government set the limit of the land size that an individual peasant could own (Quinlan et al. 2015). As a result of land reform, farmers were relieved from the Imperial regime’s landlord-tenant relationship and the burden of paying tribute to the landlords. However, in the late 1970s, the government introduced cooperative farming, confiscated peasants’ smallholdings, and forced coffee producers to sell through the cooperatives for a lower price than they could obtain in the markets. These policies provoked strong local resistance against the government, and people experienced armed conflict and revolts (Aalen 2011; Vacchiato 1985). The Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (FDRE), which came to power in 1991, reversed the military government’s policies regarding traditional practices and religious freedom (Aalen 2011:97; Freeman 2002:42), and thus some traditional practices were revived. This was followed by the rapid expansion of Protestantism due to massive and pronounced proselytization by local missionaries that was not possible during the previous regimes. Added to these influences was dissatisfaction with possession spirits and some indigenous rituals, as well as expectations of a better future through Christianity (Hamer 2002). In the 1990s, the Sidama were introduced to modern agricultural inputs such as seeds and chemical fertilizers. Recent research (Quinlan et al. 2015) and my own interviews indicate that the fertilizer improved maize yields at the beginning--and that it had been important to local people to increase yield per hectare--but price hikes in the global market limited its accessibility. Farmers could not afford the increasing cost of fertilizer--100kg of fertilizer was approximately 60 Birr (<$3USD) in the year 2000, but was increased to 800 Birr (~$40USD in 2012 (Quinlan et al. 2015; Quinlan et al. in press) and 1250 birr (~ $62.5USD) in 2014. This has had a significant effect on crop productivity--since soil has become dependent on chemical fertilizer–and Dira & Hewlett / Learning to Survive Ecological Risks increased food prices and food shortage even during the seasons of good rains. Sidama Agroecology and Risk The agroecology of Sidamaland varies between highland (above 2600 meters above sea level) and lowland altitude that ranges from 560-1700 meters above sea level (Quinlan et al. 2016). Subsistence activities and experiences of ecological risks vary along ecological zones and geographic variations (Quinlan et al. 2015). For example, herding livestock is a predominant activity in the lowlands. Sidama raise zebu cattle (Bos primigenius indicus) primarily for dairy and fertilizer (Quinlan et al. 2014; Quinlan et al. 2015). In the highlands and midlands, basic subsistence relies upon ensete (Ensete ventricosum) and maize, respectively. Ensete, which the Sidama call weese, is a banana like root and stem plant that is grown in midlands and highlands of Southern Ethiopia. The majority of the Sidama depend on weese for subsistence and to buffer uncertainty (Quinlan et al. 2014; Regassa and Stoecker 2012). Cash crops such as coffee and khat (Catha edulis) predominate at middle altitudes. Khat is a plant that contains a stimulant (cathinone) when its leaf is chewed. Compared to the lowlands and midlands, the highlands tend to receive more rainfall. People in the highlands of Hagereselam, Arebegona, and Besna districts grow barley and wheat as secondary food and cash crops, although the productivity of these crops has significantly declined in recent years due to land fragmentation. Rainfall at the middle and high altitudes were sufficient to provide for relatively productive plant life in the past (Hamer 1987:13). However, since the 1990s, all agroecological zones received highly variable rainfall. Table 1 shows the mean and variability in annual rainfall for 10 years in the three agroecological zones. The table indicates that the amount of rainfall is substantially lower—and that the variability is much greater— in the mid-lowland area as represented in the Boricha district. Rainfall variability over the last two decades has resulted in changes in the production calendar, productivity of crops and food availability. Hameso (2014) studied the perceptions of and impact of climate change among the Sidama and found that variability of rainfall patterns caused changes and/ or delays in the production calendar. Low altitude crops have started to grow in high altitude areas, while some high altitude crops no longer exist in parts of the highlands. The first author also witnessed the expansion of maize and khat in the Sidama highlands--often replacing weese. The expansion of cash crops like sugar cane and coffee is also increasing in higher altitudes. More recently, Quinlan and colleagues (2015) found that environmental shocks such as drought and crop loss are disproportionately affecting the Sidama in different areas. In the Arbegona district, drought, rainfall failure, and crop loss were almost non-existent while they were major stressors for Boricha and Hawassa Zuria districts. Boricha district, the field site for this study, is the part of the Sidama lowlands, which have been experiencing unreliable rainfall due to the rapid Table 1. Mean annual rainfall in three Sidama agroecological zones.