Pastoralism and Rangeland Management on the Tibetan Plateau in ...

3 Mountain <strong>Pastoralism</strong> in the Himalayas
Nomadism has been portrayed as one of the great advances in the evolution of
mankind. It is an adaptation by people to grassl<strong>and</strong> areas of the world where the
raising of livestock is more supportive of human life than the growing of crops.
People who specialize in livestock production requiring periodic movements of
their herds are known as nomadic pastoralists, or, simply nomads. The survival
of nomads on the Tibetan Plateau <strong>and</strong> Himalaya provides examples of nomadic
practices that were once widespread throughout Asia <strong>and</strong> Africa, but are now
increasingly hard to find. As such, these portraits of nomads offer a rare glimpse
into a way of life that is rapidly vanishing. The lives of the nomads are tuned to
the growth of the grass <strong>and</strong> the seasonal pulse of the grazing l<strong>and</strong>s. The grassl<strong>and</strong>s
provide the theatre in which the nomads <strong>and</strong> their animals interact to
make a living. Over centuries, the nomads acquired complex knowledge about
the environment in which they lived <strong>and</strong> upon which their lives depended,
which enabled them to persist in one of the most inhospitable places on earth.
But, they did more than just survive. The nomads created a unique, vibrant
culture, about which, even today, so little is known (Miller 2010).
Source: adapted from ICIMOD 2009
Figure 3: Trans-boundary l<strong>and</strong>scapes <strong>and</strong> transects in the HKH region.
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