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tribes of the omo river valley, ethiopia
The indigenous communities of the Omo Valley, including those of the Dassenech, Hamer, Nyangatom, Karo, Kwegu, and Mursi tribes, rely on the natural flood cycles of the Omo River for their sustainable practices of flood-recession farming, fishing and livestock grazing. Like generations of their forebears, they plant sorghum, maize and beans in the riverside soils after the yearly flood, relying on the moisture and nutrient-rich sediment the Omo deposits each year. In 2016, upstream of the Omo River Valley, the Ethiopian Government opened what was described as ‘the Pride of Ethiopia’ the Gibe III hydroelectric dam making Ethiopia a major energy exporter and opening up otherwise remote areas along the Omo river to large scale irrigated agriculture, including the state-owned Kuraz sugarcane scheme and foreign ventures in cotton, rice, and palm oil. The government is now transforming more than 375,000 hectares (926,000 acres) of the lower Omo into industrial plantations. Virtually all of the big sugar lands are adjacent to the west bank of the Omo River, which is vital agricultural and grazing land for the local tribal communities. In addition, by regulating the Omo’s flow, in order to generate year-round electricity, Gibe III has significant consequences downstream for the hundreds of thousands of people whose livelihoods are dependent on the annual flood. There was no flood in 2015, the fear is that subsequent releases from the dam will be too low to sustain crops on the tribes riverside lands downstream, curtailing harvests and grazing and threatening the existence of these extraordinary tribal peoples.
New York Times Magazine.