This article summarises my findings from a study in which I examined women's milk marketing activities in the Ariaal Rendille pastoral community of Karare, Marsabit District, northern Kenya. My investigations took place during the summer of 1995, as part of a larger project designed to examine the social and biological concomitants of women's milk marketing.1 The undertakings of the latter were collaborated with those of a broad-scale investigation which focused on the social, demographic and health consequences of pastoral sedentarisation in Marsabit District.2 My own research priorities were to gather details on Ariaal Rendille women's milk sales and to obtain women's perspectives on the effects of sedentism (Mitchell 1997). On the whole, investigations directed towards understanding the effects of sedentarisation on pastoral women in Africa have really just begun, but as data accumulate, findings appear to be somewhat contradictory regarding the actual repercussions on women (Joekes and Pointing 1991 : 14). On the one hand, several researchers (Fratkin and Smith 1995:433-34) claim that pastoral sedentarization in, or around towns, may bring positive benefits to some pastoral women, enabling them to increase their economic opportunities through the sale of dairy products, garden produce, petty commodities and/or wage labour. They (1995:450) also suggest that pastoralists' proximity to town markets may lead to improvements in child nutrition since women can use their earnings from milk sales to purchase household grain supplies on a regular basis. Other scholars (Joekes and Pointing 1991; Talle 1987, 1988, 1990) have a different opinion, claiming that pastoral sedentarization brings negative consequences for women and children. Some suggested negative effects include: the breakdown of traditional arrangements in pastoral societies regarding women's usufruct rights and men's family obligations; exacerbated wealth differences between households, causing reduced solidarity among females; increased workloads for women; lowered household milk supplies due to drought-induced livestock loss and pastoral economies geared towards meat production and milk sales; increased household grain consumption; and, reduced quality of child nutrition. My assessment of women's milk marketing activities in three Ariaal settlements of the Karare community supports the latter contention, which is, that sedentarization brings negative consequences for pastoral women and children. Overall, my findings suggest that Ariaal women's marketing activities arose from