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Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | Riverbank Cultivation in the Lower Omo Valley: The Intensive Farming System of the Kara, Southwestern Ethiopia |
Author: | Matsuda, Hiroshi |
Year: | 1996 |
Periodical: | Senri Ethnological Studies |
Issue: | 43 |
Pages: | 1-28 |
Language: | English |
Geographic term: | Ethiopia |
Subjects: | Kara (Ethiopia) land use agricultural land Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) Agriculture, Natural Resources and the Environment Development and Technology |
Abstract: | The Kara, who live in the lower Omo valley in southwestern Ethiopia, mainly engage in grain cultivation and small animal husbandry, and, occasionally, hunting and fishing. They regard themselves as pastoralists but in actual fact their diet is based predominantly on farm products obtained through riverbank cultivation on the banks of the Omo. The present paper deals with the Kara and their riverbank system of agriculture. The author carried out fieldwork in the village of Dus on the Omo River for about three months from October 1986 through February 1987. In the first section he considers the Kara and the natural and social environment in which they live and describes the riverbank cultivation system in relation to indigenous African agriculture, demonstrating the universality and significance of hydroagriculture. The second section explains Kara riverbank cultivation: the distribution and ownership of cultivated land, types of arable land and crops, the labour system and the agricultural calendar. In the third section, the author analyses Kara farming techniques and the way the Kara use the environment, and indicates the role of intensive agriculture in Kara economic life. Bibliogr., notes. |