Featured image: Somali herdsmen leading camels in Ceel Dhere District, Galgaduud Region.
Located on the Horn of Africa, Somalia (as defined by its pre-break-up boundaries) is, at 246,201 square miles in area, about the size of France. Somalia’s arid to semi-arid climate primarily supports rangeland vegetation suitable for grazing livestock, including cattle, sheep, goats, and the largest population of camels in the world. Consequently, eighty percent of all Somalis are nomadic to semi-nomadic pastoralists, and livestock production is a major component of the economy.
Mobile livestock keeping on natural grazing land is Somalia’s major land use.
(Herlocker, D. et al., 1997. Renewable natural resources and production systems: Issues and priorities. IUCN.)
Surveys and studies of Somalia’s rangelands have been carried out since the early 1900’s. Unfortunately, much of the resultant information was not widely published and is, therefore, now hard to obtain. We are accumulating as much as possible of the past research into digital format so that it can be more broadly accessed, leveraged, and preserved. The results will be presented, over several posts, within the context of (a) journals and bulletins, (b) reports relevant to northern, central, and southern Somalia respectively , and (c) to Somalia as a whole.
Somalia and its administrative districts prior to Somaliland (in the north) becoming self-governing. Central Somalia is defined by Hiiraan, Galgaduud, and Muduug regions.
(JRC, European Commission, CC BY 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.)
- Digital copies of Somali Rangeland Bulletin and Journal of Range Science. Over a number of years the country’s National Range Agency published two successive periodicals, Somali Rangeland Bulletin, and Somali Journal of Range Science, devoted to rangeland resources and their ecology, uses, and management.
- Research reports on the northern rangelands of Somalia. Digitized copies of printed reports and research from diverse sources. Includes summaries of 27 reports for which digital copies are not available.
- Research reports on the central rangelands of Somalia