A. Waters-Bayer and E. Taylor-Powell
Social Scientists
ILCA Subhumid Zone Programme
Abstract
Introduction
The ILCA case study areas
Conclusions
References
The subhumid zone of Nigeria is sparsely populated relative to the humid coast and the semi-arid north. Immigration into the zone from these areas as a result of population growth and expansion of cultivation is changing the physical environment of the zone, in particular reducing the habitat for tsetse flies.
The indigenous population of the zone consists of numerous fragmented ethnic groups who lived in nucleated and often fortified settlements. Pacification permitted greater freedom of movement, resulting in a dispersed settlement pattern.
As a consequence of the jihad in the nineteenth century and the expansion of cultivation in the north in the present century, cattle-keeping Fulani have penetrated the subhumid zone and now comprise roughly 5% of the rural population there. Herds from the north traditionally grazed in the Middle Belt during the dry season, when relatively abundant forage and water were available and the tsetse fly was more restricted than during the rains. The major southward shift of cattle into the zone for year-round grazing has taken place since about the 1950s.
Cattle keepers in the subhumid zone can be classified according to enterprise system and degree of mobility as follows:
1. Pure pastoralists: full-time cattle keepers ranging from those with no consistent association with a particular area (nomads) to those based at one site.2. Agropastoralists: cattle keepers who practice some cropping, but such that it is subsidiary to cattle husbandry.
3. Cattle-keeping farmers: crop farmers who keep same cattle, but such that cattle husbandry is subsidiary to cropping.
The majority of Fulani in Nigeria today belong to the second group, often living in the midst of indigenous farming communities.
The ILCA Subhumid Zone Programme is conducting livestock systems research in three case study areas. Kurmin Biri is a site of government-assisted settlement of pastoralists on a grazing reserve with low cultivation and cattle densities. Abet is an area of spontaneous settlement of Fulani pastoralists in the midst of crop farmers, with cultivation and cattle densities slightly above average for the subhumid zone as a whole. Ganawuri is an area of high cultivation density where the indigenous farmers have diversified into cattle husbandry.
The subhumid zone of Nigeria, as of West Africa as a whole, is sparsely populated in comparison with the humid coastal region and the semi-arid zone to the north. The subhumid zone corresponds roughly with the area known as the Middle Belt, between latitudes 8°30'N and 10°30'N, covering 40% of Nigeria's total area but containing only about a quarter of its population.
The low population density has been attributed in part to generally low soil fertility, the incidence of various human and animal diseases (above all, sleeping sickness and trypanosomiasis carried by the tsetse fly) and the history of inter-tribal warfare plus slave-raiding by the northern Hausa-Fulani empires and southern kingdoms prior to this century.
Nigeria has the largest human population of any country in Africa, and is ethnically one of the mast diverse. Demographic statistics are unreliable. The present population may be in the order of 90-100 million, and the growth rate is generally assumed to be about 2.5% per annum. Resulting expansion of cultivation has led to immigration into the subhumid zone from the more densely cultivated areas in the north and south. The rate of population increase in the subhumid zone is, therefore, higher than the average for the country as a whole. One study in the Lafia area suggested an increase of about 5% per annum in the period from the early 1960s to the early 1970s (Putt et al, 1980). This expansion of population and cultivation has changed the physical environment of the zone, above all by reducing the habitat for tsetse, as explained in more detail in the section on trypanosomiasis. Population distribution in the zone is currently uneven. Most densely populated are the southern. peripheral areas, with well over 200 persons/km2, while vast areas are extremely sparsely inhabited, e.g. Borgu, Kontagora, and parts of the Benue Valley.
The indigenous population of the subhumid zone consists of a variety of small, fragmented ethnic groups, in contrast to the large clusters of state-building peoples to the north and south; this suggests that the zone served as a refuge for weaker population groups. Nucleated and often fortified settlements were the rule before pacification was enforced by the British at the beginning of this century. Each ethnic group usually lived in a defined contiguous territory, and expanded or contracted according to its relative martial strength. Since pacification, there has been greater freedom of movement within the zone. Territorial patterns have become more diffuse, with enclaves of some ethnic groups within the territories of others. Certain groups, e.g. the Tiv, tend to be more expansionist than others in their search for new, farm land. This process is continuing, and changes in territorial claims and concomitant boundary disputes can also be expected in the future.
The settlement form within ethnic areas has also become more diffuse. Many hill settlements with terraced gardens have been abandoned for more accessible and productive sites on the plains, where hamlets have sprung up with only a few compounds as a nucleus to which several isolated compounds, each surrounded by farm land, regard themselves as linked.
In addition to intra-zonal movements, members of various other ethnic groups have penetrated the zone, particularly Hausa and Fulani from the north and Yoruba and Igbo from the south, mainly traders and farmers. Some areas, above all around the larger towns established in the present century as administrative, communication and commercial centres, e.g. Kaduna, now contain a multiplicity of ethnic communities, including expatriate groups.
The indigenous people of the subhumid zone traditionally held animistic beliefs. The majority have now become Christian, like most of the immigrants from the south. The Hausa and Fulani immigrants from the north are almost exclusively followers of Islam. In the northern part of the zone, Hausa is now the lingua franca; English is more widespread further south, and Fulfulde in the east. However, each of the hundreds of ethnic groups in the subhumid zone of Nigeria has still retained its own language.
Largely as a result of the empire-building activities of Fulani forces in the nineteenth century and the retreat of pastoralists faced with expansion of permanent cultivation in northern Nigeria in the twentieth century, cattle-keeping Fulani are now widespread throughout the subhumid zone, although they comprise only a small part (roughly 5%) of the zone's total rural population. Traditionally, the Fulani were thought to have led a nomadic existence, inhabiting the north of Nigeria in the wet season and moving southwards in the dry season, when relatively abundant forage and water resources were available in the Middle Belt and tsetse fly distribution was more restricted than during the rains. This was probably the general pattern until a few decades ago, although some cattle-keeping Fulani groups have been using the subhumid zone year-round for almost two centuries. These groups possibly found pockets of lower trypanosomiasis pressure and/or built up herds of zebu cattle with some degree of resistance to the disease. Since about the 1950s, there has been a marked southward drift in the distribution of Nigeria's cattle population (Fricke, 1979; Putt et al, 1980). Those Fulani who are now operating entirely within the subhumid zone appear to have gradually shortened their pattern of seasonal herd movements, established more permanent settlements and increased their cropping activities.
The various Fulani groups which inhabit the subhumid zone either seasonally or year-round vary greatly in their life-style and mode of livestock husbandry. The Fulani are generally classified according to their mobility, e.g. nomadic, semi-nomadic, semi-settled, settled (e.g. van Raay, 1975). For the planning and implementation of cattle development, it is perhaps more useful to classify them according to enterprise system (cf. Fricke, 1979) into two major groups:
1. Full-time cattle keepers ranging from those with no consistent association with a particular area (nomads) to those based at one site; this group can be referred to as 'pure pastoralists';2. Cattle keepers who practice some cropping, but such that cropping is subsidiary to cattle husbandry; these 'agropastoralists' can be divided into those who crop at one site but seasonally move all or some of their cattle to other grazing areas, i.e. transhumant agropastoralists; and those who keep cattle year-round close to the site of their cropping activities, i.e. sedentary agropastoralists.
By far the majority of Fulani in Nigeria today belong to the latter group. In various areas of the subhumid zone, these livestock keepers are operating in the midst of indigenous farming communities. Some Fulani groups have adopted local customs and language and inter-married with the indigenous people to such an extent that they can be considered absorbed, e.g. in Nupe land (Udo, 1979). In other areas, they have retained their identity as Fulani even though cattle keeping may have became subsidiary to their farming activities. In any case, only a small proportion of the estimated 2.5 million cattle-keeping Fulani in Nigeria today (van Raay, 1975) are nomads without a fixed home base.
Moreover, the dominance of the Fulani in cattle keeping has been declining. In the past few decades, indigenous farmers have managed to acquire cattle, either as wages for herding for the Fulani or through purchase using earnings from crop sales. Thus, a gradual disintegration of the ethnic division between herding and cropping is taking place. Same of the zone's indigenous people, as well as some Fulani, can be included in a third group of cattle keepers classified according to enterprise system:
3. Crop farmers who keep some cattle, but such that cattle husbandry is subsidiary to cropping; these will be referred to hereafter as 'cattle-keeping farmers'.
There are even individuals in the indigenous ethnic groups in the subhumid zone who could now be classified as agropastoralists. An overview of the classification of cattle keepers according to enterprise system is presented in Table 1.
Table 1. Classification of cattle keepers in the subhumid zone of Nigeria.
|
Enterprise system
|
Mobility: |
||
|
No home base Cattle movements throughout year |
Home base Seasonal cattle movements |
Home base No major cattle movements |
|
|
Full-time |
Nomadic pastoralists |
Transhumant pastoralists |
Sedentary pastoralists |
|
Cattle husbandry with subsidiary cropping |
- |
Transhumant agro-pastoralists |
Sedentary agro-pastoralists |
|
Cropping with subsidiary cattle husbandry |
- |
- |
Cattle keeping farmers |
Three case study areas were selected by the ILCA Subhumid Zone Programme for detailed studies of livestock production systems, component research and intervention testing (Figure 1). They represent areas of low, slightly above average, and high cultivation densities (Table 2) relative to the zone as a whole.
Table 2. Human and cattle population and cultivation densities in ILCA case study areas in the Nigerian subhumid zone.
|
|
Case study area (CSA) |
||||||
|
Kurmin Biri |
Abet |
Ganawurid |
|||||
|
Aerialb survey area |
Intensivec CSA |
Aerialb survey area |
Intensivec CSA |
Aerialb survey area |
Intensivec CSA |
||
|
People/km2 |
12 |
4 |
70 |
70 |
n.k.e |
85 |
|
|
Cattle/km2: |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Wet season |
4 |
5 |
23 |
25 |
n.k. |
n.k. |
|
|
Dry season |
18 |
10 |
37 |
40 |
24 |
21 |
|
Cultivation density (%) |
15 |
5 |
24 |
25 |
33 |
41 |
|
a Coordinates indicate centre point of case study area.
b Source: Milligan et al (1979).
c Estimates based on ground observations.
d Source: Milligan et al (1984).
e Not known.
The Kurmin Biri and Abet case study areas (both roughly 2500 km2) were surveyed by air in 1979, with repeat surveys in 1984. Ground work in Kurmin Biri began in 1979 in the Kachia Grazing Reserve (310 km2), established by the Nigerian Government for the settlement of Fulani pastoralists, and was expanded at the intervention testing stages of the research to the non-reserve Fulani settlement area around the town of Kachia. Ground work in Abet began in 1979 on the Abet Plains (ca 60 km2), where Fulani pastoralists had settled spontaneously in the midst of crop farmers, and was expanded in 1981 to include Fulani settled close to the town of Zonkwa, mainly in the Madauchi village area. Until early 1984 the programme had concentrated on Fulani cattle keepers but, in view of the diversification of indigenous crop farmers into cattle husbandry and the possibility that same of the interventions being developed by ILCA would well suit this situation, an additional case study area - Ganawuri - was then included in the programme. An aerial survey of Ganawuri and environs (ca 800 km2) was conducted and ground work in the Kaduna River valley of Ganawuri (ca 40 km2) began in 1984.
Figure 1. ILCA study areas in the subhumid zone of Nigeria.
An overview of population and land-use characteristics in these case study areas is presented here. A more detailed account of settlement and land use by Fulani agropastoralists in Abet and Kurmin Biri, the areas of spontaneous and government-assisted settlement respectively, is given in Paper 11.
Kurmin Biri case study area
Annual rainfall in the Kurmin Biri case study area is roughly 1200 mm, of which 95% falls between April and October. About 50% of the natural vegetation consists of tree savanna; the rest is mainly woodland and scrubland, except for cultivated areas in the northwest and southeast and along the Kaduna - Kachia road (Figure 2). Human and cattle population and cultivation densities in the aerial survey area of 2500 km2 and the intensive case study area of 100 km2 are given in Table 2. Fallow land accounts for about 15% of total area in the aerial survey region. The proportion of land under fallow is greatest in the west, while there appears to have been a recent increase in use of the southeastern region for cultivation. Distribution of cultivation and pastoral activities is influenced by the fact that the south-central part of the aerial survey region is used for military purposes.
Figure 2. Kurmin Biri aerial survey area, indicating case study area.
Within the Kurmin Biri aerial survey area lies the Kachia Grazing Reserve of 31 000 ha, the initial site of ILCA's research. Established in 1970 by the Kaduna State Ministry of Animal and Forest Resources, this grazing reserve was one of numerous areas demarcated by the ten northern states to safeguard land for grazing by traditional livestock producers.
The concept of preserving rangeland for the exclusive use of livestock dates back to pre-colonial times. Following the Fulani conquest in the north, the traditional hurmi (grazing grounds) were allocated to pastoralists around towns and villages and in many cases served as the sole source of fodder during the cultivation season. However, with increasing population and no legal statute to prevent encroachment by farming, most hurmi and their connecting burtali (cattle paths) disappeared under cultivation (Nigeria, 1978). The alienation of grazing lands was increasing throughout the north due to rising population and cultivation pressures as well as to an increasing ruminant population resulting from improved veterinary services and the tsetse campaign. Thus, during the 1960s, certain forest reserves in the areas cleared of tsetse were designated for use as grazing reserves by pastoral nomads.
The idea of preserving grazing land through the establishment of reserves was then put before the legislature in 1965 as the Grazing Reserve Law for Northern Nigeria. This law still prevails today. During the period of the Third National Plan, a target figure was set of 22 million ha to be acquired by the 10 northern states as grazing reserves (Ministry of Agriculture, 1981), but in fact only 2.3 million ha had been acquired by 1980 (Oxby, 1982): "...the expected reservation of about one third of the northern states for their livestock has only fractionally been realized during the last 12 years" (Nigeria, 1978). Selection and acquisition of grazing lands as well as compensation for the land have been solely up to the individual states. Thus, given the Federal Land Use Act of 1978 with its recommended high levels for land compensation, few reserves have been actually gazetted and many states have delayed or terminated their reservation plans (Nigeria, 1978). Because of the absence of formal gazetting, any investment in development is insecure and the central objectives of legalizing grazing rights, securing title to land and inducing pastoralists to settle have not occurred as envisioned.
The Kachia Grazing Reserve consists mainly of relatively flat land covered with tree savanna and shrub. It has few low-lying (fadama) areas suitable for dry-season grazing. Cultivation density within the reserve is estimated at 5% or less. In 1979, only four Fulani households were known to be settled in the reserve (Phillipson, 1979). In 1984, 34 Fulani households were recorded as settled in the reserve, keeping herds ranging in size from 4 to 125 head of cattle. The Fulani are concentrated in a relatively small area close to the administrative camp in the southeast corner of the reserve. This area of about 100 km2 has been the site of an intensive case study by ILCA. A major road (Kaduna - Kachia) runs along the western edge of the reserve. All-season laterite roads serve the developed southeast corner of the reserve; the remaining area is inaccessible by vehicle.
The grazing reserve was sprayed in 1967 and declared tsetse-free. Past development efforts have focussed an encouraging Fulani to settle and establishing an infrastructure, including administrative headquarters, roads, fire-breaks, dams and cattle dips. More recently, with the involvement of the Federal Livestock Department, the National Livestock Project Unit (NLPU) and ILCA in the development of the reserve, efforts include a farmer service centre, credit scheme, veterinary service, bore wells, and experimentation with various methods of pasture improvement. Previously under the Kaduna State Ministry of Animal and Forest Resources, the development programme of the reserve is now largely funded by the World Bank through the NLPU, and includes a field staff of about 24.
The grazing reserve lies to the north and west of major migration routes followed by transhumant Fulani based in the Kano and Bauchi areas, who trek to and from their dry-season grazing grounds in the Abet aerial survey area and around Abuja (Federal Capital Territory). However, some transhumant Fulani branch off the migration routes to use the Kachia reserve for dry-season grazing. As a result of this influx, dry-season cattle density in the reserve is estimated at 10 head per km2, compared with 5 during the wet-season. In the aerial survey area as a whole, dry-season cattle density (18 head/km2) is over four times higher than wet-season density.
The Ikulu people are the indigenous population of the Kurmin Biri area. Their main occupation is cropping, but they also keep same livestock mainly poultry, goats and pigs, and occasionally one or two cattle for fattening. Three Ikulu village enclaves are inside the grazing reserve, and several more villages are located along the western and southeastern edges of the reserve.
While an objective of the Grazing Reserve Law has been to encourage the settlement of nomads, none of the current settlers on the reserve were previously nomadic. All are Kachichere Fulani whose families have been resident in southern Kaduna State (formerly Southern Zaria Emirate) for generations. Several households had been living in the Kurmin Biri area, although they might have relocated every few years within a limited radius. They consider themselves indigenous to the Kurmin Biri area. The other households which have settled in the reserve within the past 6 years have came from within 100 km of Kurmin Biri.
Abet case study area
The Abet case study area has an average rainfall of 1270 mm per annum, of which 95% falls between April and November. The vegetation consists of woodland and tree savanna in the upland areas, and scrubland in the lowland areas. Human and cattle population and cultivation densities in the aerial survey area of 2500 km2, and the intensive case study area of ca 60 km2, are presented in Table 2.
Cultivation is spread fairly evenly over the entire region, and tends to be close to low-lying areas and water courses. Fallow land accounts for roughly one third of the aerial survey area.
A second aerial survey carried out in 1984 (dry season) indicated a slight but non-significant decrease in cattle density from 37 to 32 head per km2, suggesting somewhat less movement of non-resident herds into the region. This may be attributable to the outbreak of rinderpest in 1983, which continued into 1984, restricting herd movements in some areas of Nigeria and causing deviation from customary transhumance patterns in other areas. Distribution of cattle has not changed substantially over the past 5 years, with the greatest concentration still in the southwest quadrant of the survey area, and relatively few cattle in the southeast.
In 1984 the mean level of cultivation was 20%, slightly but not significantly lower than in 1979. The slight decrease probably reflects the lateness of the rains in the 1983 wet season, which prevented farmers from cultivating as large an area as in a more normal season.
The intensive case study area referred to here as the Abet Plains consists of flat to undulating land (ca 900 m a.s.l.) lying to the north of the Gurara River and bordered by groups of granite inselbergs to the north and east and by the sole inseleberg of Jaban Togo to the west (see Figure 3). The plains are transected by seasonally flowing streams which retain surface water throughout the dry season. Abet is linked to the towns of Zonkwa in the northeast and Kafanchan in the southeast by two laterite roads which are motorable year-round, although with difficulty in the wet season.
Figure 3. Abet aerial survey area, indicating case study area.
The indigenous population of the Abet Plains belongs to the Kaje and Kamantan ethnic groups. Several generations ago, the Kaje migrated westwards from the edge of the Jos Plateau to Kurmin Biri, near the present town of Zonkwa. Two large clan groupings moved further south to the hills on the eastern edge of the Abet Plains, seeking refuge from inter-tribal warfare and slave-raiding. They planted small plots of arable land close to their village and ventured onto the plains only for hunting and in order to cultivate some land immediately at the foot of the hills. It was not until pacification at the turn of the present century that they moved down to settle on the plains. Before pacification, the Kamantan were living mainly in the hills to the north of the plains, although some families had established small settlements in the shelter of thickets (kurmi) lining the streams on the plains. Segments of the expanding Kaje clans gradually spread into areas in which the Kamantan had been or were still living and farming. The Abet Plains are now a mosaic of Kaje and Kamantan settlements, the former predominating, and disputes occasionally arise over the tribal and family ownership of specific plots of land,
The settlement form on the plains is dispersed in contrast to the confined hill settlements. A farming compound typically comprises two or three closely related households, such as father with married sons or married brothers. Each household within a compound is an independent economic unit which farms separately and has its own cluster of houses, kitchen areas, grain-drying platform, granaries and livestock enclosures. Most structures are of mud-brick with thatched roof. The aerial survey of 1979 noted a ratio of eight grass roofs to one 'thin' roof (galvanized corrugated metal sheets). The main occupation of the Kaje and Kamantan is crop farming, but they also collect sylvan produce (e.g. locust beans, wild hone) and keep some pigs, goats, sheep and poultry
The Kaje and Kamantan have customary rights of land occupancy. Land is inherited patrilineally, being divided more or less equally among the sons, though reportedly the senior son has first choice of location. Since land city is not a problem in this area, land can be obtained easily on loan if the inherited portion is insufficient. Ownership of former and present farm land is considered by the Kaje and Kamantan to be vested in the family; other land within the generally recognized ethnic territories is in the control of the chiefs. Farm land sales have not been recorded as yet, although one was under negotiation in 1984 and land has been sold previously for he use construction.
School attendance and rural-urban drift are depriving the Kaje and Kamantan households of their youthful labourers. Land must be left fallow on account of labour shortage, and the traditional rotation of plots is becoming less common. Cultivation density is highest within and around the village clusters; fallow fields are more obvious on the periphery. Many families left the lee of the hills bordering the plains to move to the village centres of Gidan Maga, Abet and Farman when schools were opened in the 1940s, but they still retain ownership of their former farms, which are now largely fallow.
Settled Fulani comprise almost one tenth of the population on the Abet Plains. As Muslims, the Fulani are not only an ethnic but also a religious minority in a largely Christianized area. In the first decade of the nineteenth century, Fulani - Hausa jihad forces penetrated into what is now southern Kaduna State with a following of cattle-keeping Fulani. Kachichere, an upland area some 30 km east of Abet, became a centre of Fulani settlement. However, even before this time Fulani herders had been passing through or camping for several months on the Abet Plains during the dry season. Parts of the Abet aerial survey area inhabited by other ethnic groups (e.g. Jaba, Koro, Kagoma) were sites of Fulani settlement already in the nineteenth century. However, the history of Fulani - Kaje relations during the jihad was not as peaceful as in these other areas, and Fulani settlement on the Abet Plains appears to have been rare before pacification at the turn of the century.
Because the Abet area was not completely subjugated during Fulani rule in northern Nigeria, local administrative posts are held by members of the indigenous population. The present-day Fulani inhabitants thus cannot take advantage of association with a local ruling elite, as in some other parts of the subhumid zone.
The settled Fulani in Abet are mainly of the Kachichere group; only about 5% are non-Kachichere who have given up a migratory existence within the last few years. A small number of Kachichere Fulani families have been living in the Abet area for up to four generations, but the majority settled there - i.e. began to live at one site year-round - within the last three decades.
Ganawuri case study area
Annual rainfall in the Ganawuri case study area is about 1500 mm, the upper limit for the subhumid zone. The northern and eastern segments of Ganawuri District form part of the Jos Plateau; ILCA's intensive case study area is in the west and south, in the wide valley of the Kaduna River (ca 1000 m a.s.l). Here, population density is estimated at 85 persons/km2 and cultivation density ranges between 40 and 60%. The predominant ethnic group is the Aten or Ganawuri (referred to hereafter as the Ganawuri); minor groups also inhabiting the area are Ataka, Fulani and Hausa, each making up less than 5% of the total population. Transhumant Fulani pastoralists pass seasonally through the upper part of the Ganawuri District, but skirt the main population and farming area on the Kaduna Plains.
The Ganawuri are primarily crop farmers. Their staple food is acca (Digitaria exilis). Other crops include millet, sorghum, maize, rice, groundnuts, sesame or beniseed, rizga, yams, cocoyams, some cassava, and various garden vegetables. Land is under the control of the ruler of Ganawuri, but areas farmed by particular families are inherited and regarded as their own. Upon application to him, the Ganawuri chief grants immigrants use of land not being farmed, even if it had been farmed by Ganawuri people some years previously. According to the chief, no individual or family in Ganawuri District possesses an official certificate of occupancy.
Cattle-keeping Fulani of the Kachichere group began to settle around 1910 in Ganawuri on the Kaduna River plains, which even by then were said to be tsetse-free. Ganawuri boys were hired by the Fulani as herders. This practice has continued to the present day, when Kachichere Fulani, including some from the Abet and Kurmin Biri case study areas, still come to Ganawuri to seek herders. The boys earn a bull per year or a heifer every 2 years, in addition to being given board, lodging and clothing. In this way, the Ganawuri people acquire both cattle and cattle-keeping skills. They also purchase cattle from the Fulani. Ganawuri-owned cattle were formerly left in the care of settled Fulani, but in the 1940s (Berthoud, personal communication) same Ganawuri began to herd their own cattle.
The animals are kept primarily as a form of investment, eventually to be sold or consumed at ceremonies. Manure is valued for sorghum and millet fields, but not for acca because of weeding problems. The cows are milked by the herders irregularly, and not at all in the latter half of the dry season. Milk is used to a very limited extent for household consumption and occasionally sold at the 'farm gate' to settled Fulani women, who resell it at a profit.
The Ganawuri traditionally keep goats, small horses and a few sheep. Pig keeping is rare; poultry keeping is widespread. The horses were used formerly for warfare, now for hunting and ceremonial occasions. They are kept in individual mud-walled, thatched huts within the farm compound and are fed mainly on grasses cut in low-lying areas and carried to the huts. Horses are allowed to graze to a limited extent, but are usually tethered or hobbled. Goats were traditionally slaughtered and consumed at ceremonies. Horses and goats constituted the major part of the bride-price. However, by the end of the 1960s (Berthoud, personal communication) cattle were being slaughtered on ceremonial occasions and frequently formed a component of the bride-price.
Among the 12 farmers collaborating with ILCA in on-farm trials with forage plants, average cattle holding is 40 head. According to the chief, Ganawuri cattle holdings are gradually increasing, while those of the settled Fulani in the area are gradually decreasing. Both cattle-keeping farmers and Fulani say that wet-season grazing is a constraint to production because such a high proportion of the Ganawuri area is cultivated. Cattle must often retreat to the hills in the growing season. Grazing is not permitted in the Ganawuri Forest Reserve (about 60 ha of eucalyptus trees); the grass there is reserved for thatching roofs. Crop residues are freely grazed in the dry season; the cattle appear to prefer millet and sorghum, although acca residues are also grazed.
Ganawuri was chosen as a case study area in which crop farmers with traditional land rights keep cattle, and where livestock keeping by farmers appears to be on the increase. Furthermore, it is an area of high cultivation and human population density, giving an example of a future situation to be expected in other parts of the subhumid zone. The Ganawuri farmers seem to be aware of the value of Stylosanthes spp. as soil conditioners and fodder from their previous contact with a Nigerian Federal Government Soils Reclamation Programme in that area. It is therefore expected that incorporation of a forage legume into the existing production system, using techniques developed by ILCA in the Abet and Kurmin Biri case study areas, will find acceptance among the cattle-keeping farmers of Ganawuri.
The three case study areas chosen by the ILCA Subhumid Zone Programme represent some of the most widespread land ownership/use and livestock husbandry systems in the subhumid zone of West Africa. Their physical proximity makes it practical to test the applicability of interventions to different livestock production systems with the minimum of extraneous factors.
Fricke, W. 1979. Cattle husbandry in Nigeria: A study of its ecological conditions and social-geographical differentiations. Heidelberger Geographischen Arbeiten, Heft 52. Geographisches Institut der Universitaet Heidelberg, West Germany.
Milligan, K., Bourn, D. and Chachu, R. 1979. Dry and wet season patterns of cattle and land use in four regions of the Nigerian subhumid zone. Report to ILCA Subhumid Zone Programme, Kaduna.
Milligan, K., Wint, W., Bourn, D. and Rayson, F. 1984. Dry season aerial surveys over eight regions of the Nigerian subhumid zone, March/April. Report to ILCA Subhumid Zone Programme, Kaduna.
Ministry of Agriculture. 1981. The Green Revolution: A livestock production plan for Nigeria. Federal Ministry of Agriculture, Nigeria.
Nigeria. 1978. Guidelines on the development of grazing reserves. Memorandum to the National Council for Agriculture and Rural Development, Ninth Meeting of the Council, Ilorin, Nigeria.
Oxby, C. 1982. Progress in the settlement of the nomadic herders in the subhumid savannahs of Africa. Report prepared for FAO under the Program x for the Control of African Animal Trypanosomiasis and Related Development. ODI, London.
Phillipson, G. 1979. Report on social conditions among Fulani and non-Fulani groups in southern Kaduna State. ILCA Internal Communication No. 7, Kaduna, Nigeria.
Putt, S.N.H., Shaw, A.P.M., Matthewman, R.W., Bourn, D.M., Underwood, M., James, A.D., Hallam, M.J. and Ellis, P.R. 1980. The social and economic implications of trypanosomiasis control: A study of its impact on livestock production and rural development in northern Nigeria. Study No. 25, Veterinary Epidemiology and Economics Research Unit, University of Reading, U.K.
van Raay, H.G.T. 1975. Rural planning in a savanna region. Rotterdam: Rotterdam University Press, the Netherlands.
Udo, R.K. 1979. Geographical regions of Nigeria. Heinemann Educational Books. London.
