hunger, poverty and economic differentiation generated by

Japanese Journal of Human Geography (Jimbun Chiri)

Vol. 69 No. 1 (2017) 27–42

DOI: 10.4200/jjhg.69.01_027

Hunger, Poverty and Economic Differentiation Generated by Traditional Custom in Villages

in the Sahel, West Africa

OYAMA Shuichi*

(Received on 11 October, 2016; Accepted on 7 January, 2017)

I IntroductionII Hausa Farmers and the Natural

Environment of the SahelIII Farming Activities in a Harsh Natural

Environment1 Growing pearl millet under a short rainy

season2 Soil deterioration and the response of

farmers

IV Hausa Households and Subsistence Activities1 Food supply in the village2 Seasonal migrant work in the cities and

side work in the villageV Exacerbation of Food Shortages and

Economic Differentiation Generated by Traditional Custom

VI Conclusion: Hunger and Poverty Caused by Traditional Custom

Abstract

In recent years, hunger and poverty have become increasingly serious problems for crop farmers and

livestock herders in the Sahel region of West Africa. Hausa villages in central southern Niger reveal a high

degree of economic differentiation between households. While most households suffer from food shortages,

a small number of wealthy households maintain large surpluses of farm produce. This paper examines the

local contexts of economic differentiation and the role of a common traditional custom in West Africa, namely,

encampment contracts among crop farmers and herders. All of the farmers in the villages seek encampment

contracts with herders, but many are unable to raise the cash and crop payments required to enter into such

contracts. The supply of nutrients to the soil via manure from the herders’ livestock means that these

contracts act as a kind of advance investment for farmers. The encampment contracts allow Fulbe and Tuareg

herders to move their livestock around freely to graze on vegetation anywhere, regardless of who owns the

farmland where they are grazing, but at night they always return to camp on the contracted farmer’s plot. The

majority of villagers are robbed of nutrients for their soil, which are transferred to soil on the land of wealthy

farmers via manure from the herders’ livestock. Economic differentiation within the village is exacerbated

and food shortages are rendered long-term by the encampment contracts that wealthy villagers are able to

use cash reserves earned in urban areas.

Key words: population increase, economic inequality, traditional custom, manmade hunger, Sahel, Niger

* The Center for African Area Studies, Kyoto University　　　E-mail: [email protected]

Japanese Journal of Human Geography (Jimbun Chiri) Vol. 69 No. 1 (2017)28

I Introduction

The Sahel zone is located on the southern fringe of the Sahara Desert in West Africa. According to the World

Bank’s World Development Indicators 2012, the annual population growth rates are 2.4% in Senegal (as of 2007),

3.3% in Mali (2009), 2.8% in Burkina Faso (2009), and 3.7% in Niger (2008). These growth rates have led

to a doubling of the population in a very short space of time: 31 years in Senegal, 23 years in Mali, 27 years

in Burkina Faso, and just 20 years in Niger. Because of population increase, farmland is expanding into areas

unsuitable for cultivation under prevailing conditions of rainfall shortage (Reenberg et al., 1998). The land

cover change is one of the key roles in the increasingly intense competition between smallholder farmers and

livestock herder.

The region recorded a decline in crop harvests as a result of fluctuating rainfall in 2003, 2004, and 2005,

leading to major food shortages in the following years (Combé and Jézéquel, 2009; Jézéquel, 2009). The inhab-

itants of the Sahel had had previous experience of starvation following the severe droughts and food shortages

of 1973, 1974, 1983, and 1984. Crop failures for farmers and livestock losses for nomadic herders severely

weakened the base of subsistence production, rendering much of the population destitute (Somerville, 1986;

Mortimore and Adams, 2001). Thus, climatic changes have had a major impact on subsistence activities, and

continue to imperil livelihoods in the region. In recent years, hunger and poverty have become an increasingly

serious problem for the crop farmers and herders of the Sahel (Ayantunde et al., 2000; Morimore and Turner,

2005; Tschakert, 2007).

The World Bank’s African Development Indicators 2007 includes data showing that, in 2003, 32% of the popu-

lation in Niger were suffering from a calorie shortfall, and in 2004, 40% of infants were malnourished. In 2012,

for example, 5.5 million people in Niger were at immediate risk of starvation following a severe drought the

previous year, prompting the United Nations World Food Programme to appeal to the international community

to provide 800 million US dollars in emergency aid to deal with the crisis (WFP, 2012).

Bolwig (2001) analysed inter-household economic inequalities in land, labour, livestock, agro-productivity,

and cash incomes to elucidate the long-term processes of accumulation and economic differentiation in Fulani

village in northern Burkina Faso. Several studies have indicated that labour is the key resource held by poor

households in the Sahel and that the availability and use of labour are major determinants of income size and

composition (Toulmin, 1992; Raynaut, 1997). Individuals adapt to this differential access to resources and cash

income in various ways to cope with uncertainty.

Data from such studies on farm acreage and self-sufficiency rates in Hausa villages in central southern Niger

revealed a high degree of economic inequality between households. Even in the years from 2004 to 2006 when

most households suffered from food shortages, a small number of wealthy households maintained large sur-

pluses of farm produce. These inequalities between wealthy and poor households have a cumulative effect over

time that is related to a number of different factors.

The key issues involved in this economic differentiation are thought to include the distinctive Hausa out-

look on life, patterns of urban labour and cash income, and the traditional custom of encampment contracts

between crop farmers and herders that has long underpinned the life of the inhabitants of West Africa. This

Hunger, Poverty and Economic Differentiation Generated by Traditional Custom in Villages in the Sahel, West Africa (OYAMA) 29

paper examines the expanding inter-household economic gap between wealthy and poor villagers, and the local

contexts relating to how the traditional custom of encampment contracts causes the disparity in wealth.

II Hausa Farmers and the Natural Environment of the Sahel

Rain is brought to the Sahel by the northward-moving Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) under the

influence of the monsoons that develop in the Gulf of Guinea. The areas close to the Gulf benefit from good

rains, but the dryness of the landscape increases the further north one goes, eventually becoming the Sahara

Desert at 20°N. The variation in rainfall across the Sahel is attributed to the variable movements of the ITCZ.

The soils of the Sahel are predominantly Arenosols (FAO, 1971). Arenosols are composed primarily of quartz

sand; they are sandy or rudaceous, with a low proportion (around 10%) of silt and clay particles. The area

over which Arenosols are found coincides with the main production zone of pearl millet. The World Atlas

of Desertification produced by the United Nations Environmental Programme (Middleton and Thomas, 1997)

notes that the Arenosols area suffers from severe wind and water erosion.

The research site in this study, D village, is situated in Dogondoutchi Department, Dosso Region, Republic

of Niger (Figure 1). The distance to the town of Dogondoutchi, the administrative and economic centre of the

department, is about 7 km. In 2010, the village comprised 53 households and 310 residents. Fifty of these

households were farmers of Hausa ethnicity, two were Fulbe herders and one was a Tuareg herder living perma-

nently in the village. Almost all of the villagers are followers of Islam, and attend prayers at the village mosque

in the morning and evening. The rural society of the Hausa is patrilineal, and households (gida) are extended

family units centred around a male head (mai-gida), and composed primarily of his wife or wives, their married

and unmarried children, and grandchildren.

Figure 1. Map of research village.


The village is located at an elevation of 240 metres above sea level, and in the rainy season it is surrounded

by pearl millet fields. All of the soil around the village falls into the aforementioned category of Arenosols. Scat-

tered to the east of the village are a number of inselbergs, or isolated rocky hills reaching around 50 metres in

height. These inselbergs are covered in an iron duricrust, making them unsuitable for cultivation.

The meteorological station in the neighbouring town of Dogondoutchi has been recording rainfall levels

since 1923. The annual average over the past 30 years is 446 mm. Pearl millet is the crop best suited to the dry

conditions of the area, but it still requires a minimum of 300 mm per year of natural rainfall in the absence of

artificial irrigation. Thus, average annual rainfall around the village exceeds the minimum required for cultiva-

tion of pearl millet.

III Farming Activities in a Harsh Natural Environment

1 Growing pearl millet under a short rainy season

The village is surrounded by plots of mixed cultivation of pearl millet and cowpea. The cowpea is planted in

the spaces between the pearl millet plants, which are situated around 1.2 to 1.5 metres apart. The villagers’

staple diet comprises three crops: pearl millet, sorghum, and maize, but cowpeas are also cooked into a paste,

known in the Hausa language as tuwo, which is an indispensable staple food in Hausa rural society. Sorghum and

maize are grown only in very small quantities, as their low resistance to dry conditions makes them unsuitable

for low-rainfall years.

Seeds are sown on the days following substantial rainfall from around early June. The sowers work in pairs:

one walks ahead, wielding his hoe and digging planting holes in rows, while the other carries the pearl millet

seeds in a gourd, scattering the seeds into the holes and then scraping soil over them with his right foot.

From late June through early July, the villagers keep an eye on rainfall and the germination of the seeds. Seed

holes from which no pearl millet seedlings emerge are re-sown two or three more times. During the research

period, the germination rate of the pearl millet dropped because of rainfall immediately after sowing, which

gave rise to poor germination of the seeds sown in the first round.

Rainfall triggers the growth of numerous types of weeds in the villagers’ farming plots. Weeding is conducted

in two cycles during each growing season of three months. The cycles are timed in an attempt to compete with

the growth of vegetation, with the first occurring from mid-July to mid-August, and the second from mid-August

to mid-September. The weeding is conducted using thrust hoes. These distinctive implements have wooden

handles up to 2.5 to 3 metres in length holding a blade made of iron. Their Hausa name is hauya. The head of

the hoe is inserted into the soil to a depth of approximately five centimetres, then pushed back and forth in a

kind of swinging motion to cut through the roots of weeds.

Sometimes, fathers, sons and brothers work together to weed the family’s farm plot, but some are also

employed by wealthy villagers, in which case teams of between 10 and 20 work across the plot in single lines

separated by approximately 1.5 to 2.5 metres. The standard wage for one day’s weeding is between 750 and

1,500 CFA francs (1.5 to 3 US dollars). The wage paid by wealthy villagers falls in association with the severity

of food shortages in the village in years following failed harvests. Most male villagers actively engage in paid


employment in order to secure food for their households, but the poorer the harvest, the higher food prices

climb, making it very difficult to purchase sufficient food.

The pearl millet harvest begins in early September. When harvested green, pearl millet is known as tumu.

The grains are roasted after harvesting, providing a precious food source for households facing shortages. The

harvest of pearl millet and cowpeas begins in earnest as the dry season progresses in late September, and

continues through to mid-November.

2 Soil deterioration and the response of farmers

Elderly villagers recalled that, 60 to 70 years ago, spare land for cultivation remained around the village,

much of it untouched. Aerial photographs taken by the French colonial government in 1950 confirm this, show-

ing the village surrounded by uncultivated and fallow land (Figure 2). As the population grew, however, increas-

ing areas of land were cultivated, and by 2006, all arable land had been cleared for farming and the ownership of

each plot had been established.

In recent years, land suitable for cultivation has been in short supply, and it has been difficult for villagers to

Figure 2. Land use map based on aerial interpretation in 1950.


find newly cleared land. Village women have even attempted to cultivate groundnuts and Bambara beans in the

small sand hills they have found on the iron-crusted inselbergs. Allowing the land to lie fallow is no longer an

option and pearl millet and cowpeas are grown in succession each year.

Under continuous cultivation, soil fertility drops and the quality of the land deteriorates drastically. Pearl

millet crops do not grow uniformly, even within the same plot, and the difference among neighbouring plots is

often striking. The Hausa villages use three terms to classify the state of the soil in their plots: kasa, leso, and

foko1). These terms are used to assess the decline in soil fertility and productivity, with kasa denoting productive

soil, leso the early stages of soil degradation, and foko an advanced degree of degradation (Oyama, 2009, 2015).

Kasa areas have a blackish sandy topsoil containing organic material mixed with what is known as “termite

soil”. This soil, which has a loose aggregated structure, is produced when termites combine soil particles with

their saliva to create a material that they use in the construction of their nests. Leso soil contains fine white

sandy particles, and has a high proportion of sand and little organic matter. Foko denotes areas of exposed

reddish sedimentary rock so hard that it requires breaking by strong blows with a pick. Foko is poorly suited

even to pearl millet; the seeds germinate, but all of the plants eventually die off. Even soil that begins as kasa

is transformed by continuous pearl millet cultivation into leso within three to five years, and into foko after a

further three to five years (Oyama, 2012).

The villagers have not been passive in the face of this ongoing degradation of their land (Oyama and Mamman,

2010; Oyama, 2015). They explained that it is possible to turn leso and foko back into kasa, and that it is crucial

to add taki (fertiliser) to restore the productivity of these soil types. Materials used as taki include straw and in-

edible vegetation left after threshing and food preparation, as well as manure and leftover stock feed, and even

household waste such as worn-out pieces of cloth and items of clothing, plastic bags and paper cartons used for

shopping, discarded sandals and shoes, old baskets and mats, and metal cookware and plates.

Furthermore, to maintain and improve the productivity of their pearl millet plots, the farmers have tradition-

ally entered into encampment contracts with livestock herders. These contractual arrangements, called hulda

da makyaya in the Hausa language, have been widely practised for generations across semi-arid West Africa2)

(e.g., Baier, 1980; Schlecht et al., 2004).

With the arrival of the rainy season, the Fulbe and Tuareg nomadic peoples move north, crossing the marginal

cultivation zone and grazing their livestock around the edges of the Sahara Desert. The Fulbe people mainly

raise cattle with small livestock such as goats and sheep, while the Tuareg herders may have camels as well

as goats and sheep. Women and children move from one camp to another on donkeys, which are also used to

1) The deterioration of soil from kasa to leso and then to foko results in a marked decrease in the volume of pearl millet

harvests. In 2003, the average harvest of pearl millet grown in kasa soil was 1.1 tonnes per hectare; in leso it was 0.1

tonnes, and in foko it was zero (Oyama, 2009). Based on field experiments conducted in sorghum-growing areas in

Burkina Faso, Mando et al. (2005) reported that continuous cultivation of crops that did not add organic matter to the soil

leads to a significant decline in soil nutrient levels.

2) Ever since their spread across the Sahel in the 15th century, Fulbe herders have obtained supplies such as pearl millet,

sorghum, cotton, and wood and leather products from Hausa farmers in exchange for livestock and animal products.

Encampment is one aspect of the mutually beneficial relationship said to have been cultivated between farmers and

herders over this long period (Baier, 1980).


transport household possessions.

In November and December, as the rainy season comes to an end, the herders begin to move their livestock

south, passing though farming villages. By this time, the villagers have finished harvesting their pearl millet

and cowpeas, and the land surrounding the village is covered in post-harvest stubble. The herders endeavour

to select a route that will take them through the most productive farmland, and approach villagers—particularly

wealthy ones—to discuss encampment contracts.

Once the parties have reached agreement on terms such as camp duration and fees, the herder sets up his

camp on the contracted land. During the daytime, he lets his animals feed on the post-harvest stubble, leaving

them free also to graze on plots other than the one subject to the contract, and in the evening, he brings them

back to the campsite, where they spend the night. The animals nourish the soil in the vicinity of the camp with

the significant quantities of manure that they provide (Figure 3). The addition of these nutrients is crucial to the

outcome of the following season’s pearl millet crop (Schlecht et al., 2004; Shinjo et al., 2008). At the end of the

contract period, the herder receives payment from the farmer in cash and pearl millet, and leaves the village.

In February 2011, one of the villagers made a contract with a Fulbe herder for a one-week encampment of a

herd comprising 25 cows, 10 sheep and 3 donkeys. The villager paid 4,500 CFA francs (9 US dollars) in cash.

The price differs, depending on the size of the herd and the length of stay, but prices have tended to rise in

recent years. The fertilising effect of the manure from these encampments is encapsulated in the Hausa say-

ing: “Camel five years, goat and sheep three years, cow one year.” Cow manure decomposes rapidly, providing

nutrients for one year only; goat and sheep manure can last for three years, while camel manure provides five

years of fertilisation. The Hausa farmers’ understanding of the properties of livestock manure is consistent

with the scientific findings of Brouwer and Powell (1998). Villagers wishing to enter into contracts with the

Tuareg, whose herds include many camels and therefore promise highly effective fertilisation, are required to

pay a high price in cash and pearl millet.

Figure 3. Encampment contracts and soil nutrient supply to the millet fields.Photo: OYAMA Shuichi, 2015


IV Hausa Households and Subsistence Activities

1 Food supply in the village

Owing to several factors, including the shortage of land, most young men in Hausa villages continue to work

on their father’s farm and eat together with their father and siblings and their wives and children, even after

they have married and moved into a separate dwelling with their wives. Two meals are eaten daily, one in the

middle of the day and one at night. On some days, simmered cowpeas or groundnuts may also be eaten as

snacks in the morning and afternoon.

The midday meal is fura, a drink made by blending balls of pearl millet dough with water. The addition of

milk and sugar makes fura more palatable, but the high price of sugar means that such additions are rare. The

daytime temperature often exceeds 35°C in the shade, so villagers sit under trees to drink their fura, cooling

themselves while they consume their food.

The staple night-time meal is pearl millet paste (tuwo). This is accompanied by a soup that may include bean

and nuts such as cowpeas, groundnuts, and Bambala beans, meat such as goat and lamb, and leaves of wild

plants of the Malvaceae and Tiliaceae families. Cowpeas and groundnuts are sometimes used to make the staple

food, but they are more commonly used to supplement the staple food of pearl millet.

Hausa men see their ideal existence as one in which, as head of the household, surrounded by the wives and

children of their sons, they can skilfully balance food supply, cash income, and labour to attain a comfortable

existence for their entire family. As sowing time approaches, the household’s food supply is generally running

low. Livestock are sold and a portion of the income from the sale is used to purchase pearl millet. This purchase

meets the household’s staple food needs for several weeks. In the hunger season, increasing numbers of villag-

ers look to sell off livestock (cattle, goats, and sheep) in order to purchase food, causing the price of livestock to

fall and that of pearl millet to rise correspondingly. In the harvest season (October), 100 kilogrammes of pearl

millet can be bought for 12,000 CFA francs (24 US dollars), but this rises to 18,000 CFA francs (36 US dollars)

in the hunger season from March to July.

A cow can sell for 250,000 to 300,000 CFA francs (500 to 600 US dollars) in the harvest season, when it is

also well fed, but fetches as little as 200,000 francs (400 US dollars) toward the end of the dry season in May.

Similarly, a one-year-old calf that can sell for 80,000 francs (160 US dollars) at harvest time will only be worth

60,000 francs (120 US dollars) in the hunger season. Goats, sheep, and other small livestock are sold off

progressively to the village butcher or at periodical markets to earn cash to purchase more grain.

Cash income to offset food shortages can also be earned through the sale of firewood. Adult women and

children gather firewood from the surrounding shrub land and each morning carry it on their heads to the town

seven kilometres away, where a load that can be carried by one person sells for between 50 and 200 francs (0.1

to 0.4 US dollars).

If food still runs out in the household despite these extra efforts, villagers approach one of the wealthy

households (Households 1 to 3 in Figure 4) to request a debt that they use to purchase more food. Because the

price of pearl millet increases in the sowing season, many villagers use this cash to purchase cheaper cassava

instead. In its dried form, cassava is coarsely crushed and sprinkled with salt for a makeshift meal. Debts are


repaid to the wealthy villagers through weeding work undertaken in the lender’s plots the following season.

Wages are not usually paid directly to the labourers, but are instead offset against the household’s debt to the

wealthy family.

The final resort if food is still scarce even after a household has gone into debt is to harvest the leaves of the

Aduwa tree (Balanites aegyptiaca, a zygophyllaceous plant) and eat them boiled in salted water. Conditions vary

from year to year with rainfall and with the incidence of locusts, but the villagers reported that food shortages

were particularly severe after poor harvests in 2003, 2004, and 2005, and that Aduwa leaves became a crucial

food source during those times. In the 2005 season, 35 households in the village (66%) had exhausted their

stores of pearl millet by the sowing season in June, and 24 of these (45%) had entered into debt with the three

wealthy villagers in order to purchase food.

2 Seasonal migrant work in the cities and side work in the village

Smith (1971) reported that cash income from migrant work and side businesses provide important supple-

ments to pearl millet cultivation in the livelihoods of inhabitants of Hausa villages. Youths around the age 15

from the village migrate to urban areas for work during the dry season (November through May). They engage

in various types of work, including selling sweets and kola nuts from trays at markets and around bus terminals,

Figure 4. Farmland size, millet harvest and self-sufficiency in hunger season in June 2006.Notes: 1) Millet harvest in the 2005 season. Each bundle ranges in weight from 10 to 18 kilogrammes, depending on the

quantity and size of the grain it contains, which is in turn determined by soil conditions and rainfall.2) Source: interviews from the villagers. Group A: wealthy households maintaining surplus millet production. These

households can sell their surplus agro-products to the market. Group B: households able to maintain food self-sufficiency, but that find it difficult to produce surplus to sell to the market. Group C: households storing little millet, but they cannot achieve self-sufficiency. Group D: households stored no millet and required debt to purchase more food with.


grilling meat and frying bread to sell from tables, and operating stands selling coffee, baguettes, and similar

products. Some enlist the assistance of relatives and acquaintances to arrange this work, while others make

their own way to town. Daily takings from the informal trading carried out by migrant workers average 1,000 to

3,000 CFA francs (2 to 6 US dollars) per day, but can be less than 500 CFA francs (1 US dollars) on some days.

Out of the income earned, the migrants have to pay rent, meals, water, and other utilities for the duration of the

work season, but villagers still stated that the income earned this way is the foundation for a successful life.

Regardless of whether they are married or not, men continue to travel to urban centres within Niger for sea-

sonal work each dry season until they are in their late forties. The Hausa have followed this custom of actively

leaving the village and engaging in commerce in urban centres for many generations, and in this way have

contributed to the spread of Islam through West Africa (Adamu, 1978). The cash income earned by the young

males plays an important part in securing the household’s food supply, but it is not uncommon for the sons to

return to the village with no cash at all, having spent it to purchase audio equipment, mobile phones, and other

consumer items in town.

The distinguishing feature of the three wealthy households is that they all derive cash income from beyond

the village. The head of Household 1 does not even reside in the village, but works as a salaried osteopath in

a national hospital. He returns to the village once every one to three months and gives part of his salary to his

two wives to use for living expenses. In the growing season from July through September, he returns to the

village much more frequently, taking leave from his hospital duties to oversee the work tasks and procurement

of labour for his farm.

The head of Household 2 also worked in a hospital as an osteopath until his retirement at the age of 55. Now,

in his retirement years, he receives money sent to him by his son, who works at a bank in the capital, Niamey.

The man is known as an El-haji, someone who has made the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca, and is held in high

regard by his fellow villagers.

The head of Household 3 is the third-born son, who was doted on by his father who admired the son’s

shrewdness with money. Following the father’s death, under the mediation of the village head and elders, the

son inherited a larger portion of land and possessions than his two older brothers and has since used his inher-

itance to expand farming production and to operate retail stores both in the village and in Dogondoutchi, selling

household necessities and food.

These wealthy households use their ample cash income to provide debts on request to other villagers facing

food shortages. As followers of Islam, they do not charge interest on these debts, but their repayment terms do

enable them to engage the villagers as labour for weeding their farmland. They also actively use their cash and

crops to gain encampment contracts with the herders, which improves the fertility of their soil and increases

the agricultural productivity of their land.

V Exacerbation of Food Shortages and Economic Differentiation Generated by Traditional Custom

The use of encampment contracts with Fulbe and Tuareg herders as a means of maintaining and improving

the fertility of farmland is a widespread custom across West Africa. Farmers pay fees to Fulbe and Tuareg


herders to attract them to camp on their land, and the manure from the herders’ livestock provides nutrients to

the soil for farming. While farmers and herders compete for limited land during the rainy season, the dry season

brings a more cooperative relationship in the form of these encampment contracts.

However, when social relations within the village were examined more closely, it was revealed that, while the

tradition of encampment contracts has supported subsistence among farming villagers, it has also exacerbated

economic differentiation between different households and been a principal cause of the food shortages that

plague so many villagers. All of the farmers in the village aspire to obtain encampment contracts with the herd-

ers, but many are unable to raise the cash and crop payments required to enter into such contracts. The supply

of nutrients to the soil from the herders’ cattle means that these contracts act as a kind of advance investment

for farmers; in most households, however, food runs short every year, making it very difficult to secure the cash

and pearl millet required to pay for the contracts.

In the 10 years from 2002 to 2012, 32 of the village’s households entered into a total of 253 encampment

contracts, but the remaining 21 households had no contracts during this period. In other words, half of the

households in the village had no surplus cash or pearl millet, making them incapable of engaging the herders.

Of the contracts held by the 32 households, 36 locations were owned by Household 1, 25 locations were owned

by Household 2, and 34 locations were owned by Household 3. These numbers show that these three wealthy

households alone accounted for 37% of the total of the contracted 253 plots in the village.

The number of individual livestock hosted on land owned by the three wealthy households was also large

(Figure 5): 151,678 (Household 1), 108,120 (Household 2), and 38,405 (Household 3), comprising a total of

60% (298,203) of the total number of contracted livestock in the village (497,112) 3). Hence, the majority of the

Figure 5. Livestock unit of encampment contracts in the village during 10 years from 2002 to 2012.Note: Data from 2006 are missing because the author did not carry out fieldwork in Niger during this time.


herders were engaged by these three wealthy households alone, which used large numbers of livestock to build

up the nutrient supply in the soil on their land.

In the 1950s, when land was still plentiful, farming plots were surrounded by both fallow and uncleared land.

The Fulbe and Tuareg herders would let their herds graze freely on the grass on this land or on post-harvest

pearl millet stubble, returning at night to the camps they had contracted on the farmers’ plots, where the

livestock enriched the soil with large quantities of manure. Thus, this represented a system for transferring

nutrients from fallow and uncleared land to land under cultivation.

Nowadays, however, land is scarce, and pearl millet is planted wherever space is arable. The livestock graze

mainly on stubble during the day. Herders move their livestock around freely to graze on vegetation, regard-

less of who owns the land on which they graze, but at night they always return to camp on the plot they have

contracted with the farmer (Figure 6). The animals are not penned in to these camps and, with the exception of

calves, they are not tied up, so they are free to roam anywhere in the vicinity of the camp. The herders some-

times take their animals out at night to feed on stubble in nearby plots, but in general they endeavour to confine

them to the plot where they camp. They sometimes stay awake all night to watch over their herds to ensure

that they do not cross over boundaries into other plots. The herders continue these practices every day during

the contract term, so that the greater part of the manure is concentrated on the plot owned by the farmer with

whom they have entered into the contract.

The author attached GPS units to the necks of cows to measure the cows’ positions at hourly intervals. The

Figure 6. Livestock herding and pastoral camp from November 5 2004 to February 21 2005.

3) The volumes of soil nutrition imported to the farming plots were determined by multiplying the number of livestock

units by the number of days of encampment. Livestock units were calculated according to the general practice of counting

cattle and camels as one head of livestock, and small livestock (goats and sheep) as 0.15. For example, if a Hausa farmer

contracts with a Fulbe herder (who has a herd of 10 cattle and 20 goats) for a 30-day encampment, the imported plant

biomass volume would be (10×1+20×0.15)×30=390 head-days.


household numbers owning the farmland are consistent with Figure 5. During the daytime, the herder grazed

livestock freely on millet stubble and endeavoured to confine them to the plot where they had their camp. The

camp was set up on the farmland of Household 5 for two weeks from November 5 to 19 2004, on the land of

Household 8 for 27 days from November 19 to December 15 2004, and on the land of Household 3 for 52 days

from January 1 2004 to February 21 2005.

When the herders depart, virtually no vegetation remains on the surface where the livestock have grazed

on the pearl millet stubble. The herders’ animals consumed the vegetation during the day on the plots owned

by the 32 households that were unable to enter into encampment contracts, but the nutrients from those plots

were then deposited to enrich the land of the wealthy farmers where the herders had their contracted

camps. In other words, the majority of the villagers, Group B, C, and D were robbed of the nutrients in their

soil, which were transferred to the soil on the land of the wealthy farmers, Group A via the manure from the

herders’ livestock.

Compared to the land of most of the villagers, the land of the wealthy farmers of Group A is kasa, with high

soil fertility and elevated pearl millet crop yields. Economic differentiation within the village is exacerbated and

food shortages rendered long-term by the encampment contracts, which wealthy villagers are able to enter into

using their large reserves of cash earned in urban areas. The contracts operate to concentrate soil nutrients on

the wealthy farmers’ land and to rob nutrients from the soil of other villagers’ land.

In Hausa societies, people need to invest resources and labour on their farmland continuously to secure their

crops of pearl millet and cowpeas. This applies equally to both the wealthy Group A and the other villagers.

The land owned by the ex-mayor of Dogondoutchi lies close to the village examined in this study, and he uses

the wealth generated from numerous years of work at a foreign-owned bank to buy up farmland and enter into

encampment contracts with multiple herders, continuously adding nutrients to the soil on his land. Even the

wealthiest villagers cannot afford to neglect their encampment contracts and management of their land, so they

ensure that their extensive plots do not rapidly lose their fertility and become unproductive.

VI Conclusion: Hunger and Poverty Caused by Traditional Custom

Many farming households in Africa are unable to obtain high-priced chemical fertilisers, and the effectiveness

of domestic livestock manure as a fertiliser has been widely documented (Speirs and Olsen, 1992; Rufino et

al., 2007). The use of such manure by households in the West African Sahel has, at times when there is some

freedom as to how household land can be used, enabled nutrients to be transferred from unused or fallow land

to active farming plots, and the nutrients used to cultivate pearl millet. The importance of livestock manure in

the region is encapsulated in the transfer and accumulation of nutrients from unused or fallow land to farming

land through the traditional custom of entering into encampment contracts.

However, as cultivated land expands and livestock is grazed primarily on post-harvest stubble, competition

for soil nutrients occurs among different farming plots. Variations in nutrient levels affect the size of pearl millet

harvests, and in particular households living at subsistence level suffer chronic food shortages.

The Sahel is characterised by high population growth, large fluctuations in rainfall, and poor soil quality.


In this harsh environment, the wealthy few have expanded their agricultural production using cash income

earned outside the village, and have been able to attain levels of crop production beyond those required for

self-sufficiency to sustain their own livelihoods. In contrast, the majority of people in the villages have seen

their agricultural production diminish, and face food shortages year after year, barely managing to provide

for themselves.

To secure the agricultural production essential to maintain an adequate livelihood demands continuous in-

vestment through the maintenance of soil fertility and supply of labour for weeding work. This investment is

supported by cash income obtained through work undertaken outside the village.

Economic differentiation among rural residents has appeared in work patterns, labour migration, and cash

income generation in the cities. In recent years, the economy of Niger has become more closely tied to that

of neighbouring countries, as well as those of Europe. As globalisation progresses, economic differentiation

continues to increase. The previous research focused on the conflicts over land resource among crop farmers

and livestock herders in Sahel region (Hussein et al., 1999; Moritz, 2010; Turner et al., 2011), but it is reflect-

ed in the increase in competition over food production within rural villages. We should pay attention on the

resource conflicts, economic differentiation and growth in the number of people who are regularly faced with

food shortages.

Acknowledgements

This paper is based on a presentation of the joint session “Conflict in Africa and “African Potentials” for

achieving coexistence based on indigenous knowledge and institutions” in the Conference of International

Geographical Union 2013 (IGU2013) held in Kyoto. The author would like to express my gratitude for the finan-

cial support of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (KAKENHI

23221012, 25300011, 15H02591, 16H06318).

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西アフリカ・サヘル地域における伝統的慣習が生み出す飢餓と貧困，経済格差

大　山　修　一京都大学アフリカ地域研究資料センター

（2016年10月11日受付，2017年1月7日受理）

西アフリカ・サヘル地域の農村部において食料不足が慢性化しているにもかかわらず，世帯間の格差は大きく，富裕層は余剰作物を生産しつづけている。本論文は，農村部における経済格差と，その経済格差が生じる原因を地域の文脈にそって明らかにする。サヘル地域では，農耕民と牧畜民のあいだで野営契約が結ばれてきた。この野営契約は西アフリカのサヘル地域で広く見られるものである。野営契約によって，牧畜民とその家畜は農耕民の畑に滞在し，周辺の畑で放牧が許される。牧畜民は農耕民からトウジンビエや現金などの報酬を受け取るかわりに，農耕民の畑には家畜の糞が落とされ，作物を生産する畑の養分となる。牧畜民に野営契約を依頼できるのは村の富裕者のみであり，彼らは多額の村外収入をもつ。この富裕者の畑には野営契約によって養分が集積するが，周囲に広がる貧困層の畑では植物が家畜によって食べられ，養分が収奪されている。富裕者と貧困層の作物生産には大きな差異があり，農耕民と牧畜民の間で結ばれる野営契約という伝統的慣習によって，経済格差が拡大しつづけている。

キーワード：人口増加，経済格差，伝統的慣習，人為的な飢餓，サヘル，ニジェール

hunger, poverty and economic differentiation generated by

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