No longer tracking greenery in high altitudes: Pastoral practices of Rupshu nomads and their implications for biodiversity conservation

Abstract

Nomadic pastoralism has thrived in Asia's rangelands for several millennia by tracking seasonal changes in forage productivity and coping with a harsh climate. This pastoralist lifestyle, however, has come under intense transformations in recent decades due to socio-political and land use changes. One example is of the high-altitude trans-Himalayan rangelands of the Jammu and Kashmir State in northern India: major socio-political reorganisation over the last five decades has significantly impacted the traditional pasture use pattern and resources. We outline the organizational transformations and movement patterns of the Rupshu pastoralists who inhabit the region. We demonstrate the changes in terms of intensification of pasture use across the region as well as a social reorganisation due to accommodation of Tibetan refugees following the Sino-Indian war in 1961 to 1962. We focus in particular on the Tso Kar basin -an important socio-ecological system of livestock herding and biodiversity in the eastern Ladakh region. The post-war developmental policies of the government have contributed to these modifications in traditional pasture use and present a threat to the rangelands as well as to the local biodiversity. In the Tso Kar basin, the number of households and livestock has almost doubled while pasture area has declined by half. These changes have potentially negative consequences for the long-term resilience of nomadic pastoralism as well as for the survival of rare local wildlife. To increase the pastoralist standard of living, having fewer pastoralists may be the only solution, and alternative livelihood options may bring this about. Development programmes should concentrate on enhancing opportunities for herders so that there is a greater diversity of employment opportunities and potentially better chances for the persistence of biodiversity.

Comparison of social-ecological resilience between two grassland management patterns driven by grassland land contract policy in the Maqu, Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau

“…Historically, the herders of Maqu engaged in transhumant pastoralism with yak and Tibetan sheep based on collective management, an apparently environmentally sustainable use of the land (Cao et al, 2011;Yan et al, 2005). However, in the 1990s grassland management in this region, as in other countries around the world, was changed significantly through a set of policies of grassland contracts (Cao et al, 2011;Harris, 2010;Veeck et al, 2015) due to the influence of socio-political circumstances (Andersen et al, 2014;Singh et al, 2013). Although all winter grasslands were required to be contracted to single-households, many of the herders were unwilling to operate in isolation because of their history of collective nomadism and dependence on the collective lifestyle (Cao et al, 2011).…”

După coada oilor: long-distance transhumance and its survival in Romania

“…This journal has aired such issues: see particularly Heikkinen et al (2011) for how Finland's herders are organised. Singh et al (2013) outlines an insurance scheme that encourages northern Indian pastoralists to set aside grazing areas for wild herbivores, and so reduce predation on their own animals by snow leopards and wolves.…”

Spatial patterns of long‐term vegetation greening and browning are consistent across multiple scales: Implications for monitoring land degradation

“…Instead, they may target measures that help adapt to vegetation change, reduce negative impacts of land use on ecosystem services, and foster ecosystem stewardship (Akiyama & Kawamura, 2007;Bestelmeyer et al, 2011;Reid, Fernández-Giménez, & Galvin, 2014). Because grazing by livestock is the primary human land use in the Trans-Himalaya, management interventions can include improved grazing policies (Akiyama & Kawamura, 2007;Briske, 2017;Briske et al, 2011;Joyce & Marshall, 2017Papanastasis, 2009, because traditional instruments are rapidly deteriorating under pressure from external markets (Namgail et al, 2007;Singh, Bhatnagar, Lecomte, Fox, & Yoccoz, 2013). Previous experimental studies in the Trans-Himalaya have determined how grazing mediates plant-soil feedbacks, especially in Spiti region (Bagchi & Ritchie, 2010;Bagchi, Roy, Maitra, & Sran, 2017), which emerged as a degradation hotspot.…”