Abstract
Mountain rangelands are critical resources for mobile pastoralists, and they provide benefits to humankind broadly. Yet mountain pastoral social–ecological systems (SESs) face challenges that affect both mountains and rangelands. Herders' traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) underpins their adaptive strategies and serves as a resource for future adaptation. This holistic case study of Ilemchane transhumant herders in Morocco's High Atlas Mountains applies a simple framework to explore how herders' biophysical TEK, practices, and institutions interrelate and how climate and social changes affect the SES. Using participant observation, interviews, and surveys, we find Ilemchane climate, plant, and ecological knowledge shape their practices and institutions, which in turn reinforce or alter TEK. Building on a recent synthesis of mountain SES, we identify a paradox of remoteness, wherein Ilemchane remoteness both maintains traditional transhumant culture and TEK and threatens it. Overcoming this paradox may require internal organization, collective action, and external support.
Highlights
Mountain pastoralists’ traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) and adaptive strategies may serve as key resources in facing multiple social and environmental changes
We found that Ilemchane transhumant women and men hold detailed knowledge of specific plants, in line with past TEK studies in Morocco (Linstadter et al 2013; Gobindram et al 2018), and beyond (Fernandez-Gimenez 2000; Molnar 2017)
More in-depth studies that definitively correlate Tashelhit vernacular plant names and forage uses with scientific nomenclature could help preserve this TEK and support communication and management
Summary
Mountain pastoralists’ traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) and adaptive strategies may serve as key resources in facing multiple social and environmental changes. Mountain rangeland or pastoral systems are the nexus of 2 social– ecological system (SES) types: rangeland SES and mountain SES Both mountain and rangeland SES afford key benefits to humanity (water, carbon storage, pollination, wildlife habitat, and livestock forage, among others) (Sala et al 2017; Bengtsson et al 2019) and experience multiple interacting stresses and paradoxes. Klein et al (2019) identify 5 features of mountain SES that challenge sustainability: complexity, cross-scale ecosystem services, hazards, isolation, and marginalization. They find 6 paradoxes: (1) policies made by outsiders, (2) resource rich and income poor, (3) inand outmigration, (4) lack of needed data, (5) remote but vulnerable to global changes, and (6) remote but attract actors. Interacting land use, climate, and sociocultural changes threaten pastoral SESs (Galvin 2009; Dong et al 2011), yet few studies focus on mountain pastoralists’ TEK and adaptive strategies under changing conditions
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