the richtersveld cultural and botanical landscape - SAHRA

Richtersveld Cultural and Botanical Landscape World Heritage Site Nomination 49
of the country). Community services, such as health clinics, are also located in the
villages.
Generally the livestock posts are occupied and stocks managed by the elderly who
are too old to participate in the formal economy and no longer have responsibility
for children of school going age. Over weekends and during school holidays
children and family members from other age groups are found at the posts and it is
in this way that the tradition of transhumance is passed down from generation to
generation, thus insuring it perpetuation of the traditional way of life.
In the past the KhoiKhoi were known as herders of cattle and sheep. In the harsh
environment of the Richtersveld the goat, introduced to Southern Africa in colonial
times fares better and most herds are now made up of a mixture of goats and
sheep (mainly the mutton breed or ‘Dorper’) with goats, producers of both mutton
and milk, predominating. In this precarious environment man, domestic beast and
environment co-exist in a delicate balance that is testimony to the indigenous
knowledge of the Nama herdsman who knows the ‘veld’ well and is able to judge its
condition and when the time has come for the herd to move on. It is this knowledge
and its continuing and continuous practice that calls for this desert area to be
nominated for both its cultural and natural attributes.
Generally a Nama family will ‘possess’ three of four grazing camps through which it
will move its herds in the course of a year. Each camp is surrounded by an area in
which the stock farmer grazes his herds and in many cases the livestock of others
in his village a service for which he is paid. Due to the low carrying capacity of the
land, herds are small and must utilize large areas in order to be sustained.
Additionally, significant distance must be travelled between grazing areas and
during the seasonal movement of stock to and from the winter and summer grazing
areas.
In the winter rainfall season herders will be found inland from the Orange River and
will in the late winter and early summer move to one or two more camps that are
also situated inland. Late summer grazing, until the arrival of the rains is usually
alongside the river which becomes the only source of water once others have dried