Herskovits[1] showed that cattle were a dominant element among East African pastoralists’ culture and life. Cattle were important in many ways, e.g. as a symbol of wealth, dowry, and in ceremonies.

As such, the preoccupation with having large herds have been explained as having nothing to do with economic considerations, but rather with values lying outside the economic domain.

This was not Herskovits intention, however, he merely wished to stress the importance of cultural values.

Subsequently, the term the “East African cattle complex” was coined to point to the social value of cattle, often without reference to the consumption requirements of households[2].

Consequently, nomadic pastoralists have been viewed as non-rational, having an economically unreasonable attachment to livestock.

Professionals and governments often view problems, such as dramatic droughts causing the death of animals and humans, and pasture degradation in many pastoral areas, as inherent in the nomadic pastoral adaptation itself:

”Their [the pastoralist themselves] retention of pastoral economic structures based upon the maximal increase of herd size, under new conditions of limited movement and growing dessication because of rainfall failure, were seen to have led to overgrazing of pastures, environmental degradation, and the physical decline of livestock. Eventual economic collapse and famine were thus seen to follow the logic of the ‘tragedy of commons’, the inevitable outcome of lack of individual restraint on livestock production in the face of collectively owned pasture resources”[3]

This is contrast with the many anthropological studies, starting with Evans-Pritchard[4] study of the cattle keeping Nuer in Africa, showing the underlying rationale of nomadic pastoralism by focusing on the “[…] unique fit between livestock-keeping peoples and the arid lands they inhabit, between their particular social organizations and the demands of mobile livestock production”[5].

In 1976 Dahl and Hjort wrote in the introduction to their seminal book Having herds: pastoral herd growth and household economy:

“a preoccupation with the cosmological aspect of cattle easily leads to a misunderstanding of the rationale for an individual household keeping many cattle […]; the focus is then rather on the prestige aspects of having large herds, beautiful cattle etc.”[6].

In contrast,

“The tendency that pastoralists try to keep as large herds as possible is not, however, solely a result from the value system. […]. For example the unreliable rainfall leads to great fluctuations in the availability of water and grazing, both seasonally and over longer periods. For a pastoral household it is necessary to keep a margin against the risk of having part of the herds killed from a drought or an epidemy [sic]. The number of animals needed to maintain a longtime continuous production is also much larger than the number of animals immediately utilized at a certain period.”[7]

The economic rationale for having relatively large herds have been summarized by Coughenour et al.[8]:

1. Milk requirements necessitates a large fraction of mature females, giving herds excessive reproductive capability.
2. Lactating animals must provide milk to both humans and young animals.
3. Pastoralist herd 50 to 100% more animals than required for subsistence purposes only to secure survival of some animals during droughts to form the basis of a new herd[9].
4. Individual animals are, in general, characterized by low productivity, necessitating more animals per person.

In short, one compelling reason for pastoralists to keep a large herd of livestock may be viewed with reference to risk management.

Risk may be defined as unpredictable variations in ecological or economic parameters, and outcomes are viewed as more or less risky depending on their degree of variability[10].

Societies in general employ a wide range of strategies or ‘buffering mechanisms’ to counteract environmental induced scarcities. These strategies can be grouped into four major categories:[11]

1. Diversification, from the keeping of multiple livestock species  to investing in non-pastoral activities;
2. Exchange, livestock exchange networks such as stockfriendship;
3. Mobility, taking advantage of spatial and temporal heterogeneity in available forage (see also the post Climate Change, Risk Management and the End of Nomadic Pastoralism); and
4. Storage, large herd size

The efficiency of herd accumulation as a buffer strategy has been quantitatively demonstrated for the Saami reindeer husbandry where studies have shown that herders with large herds also have comparable larger herds from one year to the next[12] and during crisis periods[13] (also check out the post Why Herd Size Matters – Mitigating the Effects of Livestock Crashes).

In short, herd accumulation maximizes long-term survival for pastoralists.

This again provide the rationale for why both reindeer herders[14]  and pastoralists in general[15] invest labour to increase herd size.

Notes