loading...

Agro-pastoral radio production platform: sharing the experiences and knowledge of pastoralists and farmers for a peaceful transhumance in West Africa

Platform address: soundcloud.com/user-445095840

Community radio stations are important tools for the development of local communities in West Africa. By giving voice to grassroots actors and presenting their experiences and knowledge, radio stations are true partners in improving the living conditions of the rural populations.

ECOWAS and CILSS have made community radio stations key tools to impact community development at the grassroots level while helping to prevent and manage conflicts related to access to natural resources in the context of agro-pastoral activities.  

Media involvement, particularly community radio stations, is a major focus of the "Integrated and Secure Livestock Farming and Pastoralism in West Africa" project (PEPISAO) funded by the Agence Française de Développement (AFD). This project aims to "reduce conflicts related to pastoralism by helping build a shared regional vision on the different ruminant livestock production methods"; the project is coordinated by ECOWAS, which has delegated part of its implementation to CILSS.  

Through its activities, PEPISAO has undertaken to build the capacities of more than 60 community radio journalists in cross-border areas on the issues of pastoralism and the mechanisms for preventing and managing conflicts related to access to natural resources in the context of agro-pastoral activities. The trained journalists produced programmes on the agro-pastoral sector in their coverage area.

RADIO AGROPASTORALE brings together all the productions of the trained journalists. This platform is:

• A resource centre for journalists, decision-makers, researchers and any other direct or indirect stakeholder in agro-pastoralism in West Africa;
• A tool for sharing the experiences and knowledge of stakeholders  and partners on the prevention and management of conflicts related to access to natural resources in the context of agro-pastoral activities in West Africa;
• A database on the contribution of agro-pastoralism to West Africa’s socio-economic development;
• A tool for agro-pastoralists to learn from each other about the practice of their activities and to better understand and know the mobile livestock production sector.

RADIO AGROPASTORALE contributes, in the end, to bringing together agro-pastoralists and de-constructing prejudices about pastoralism and transhumance practice in West Africa and the Sahel.

The platform currently includes 20 radio programmes on the main pastoral occupations, experiences in agro-pastoral conflict prevention and management, the place of women and young people in the agro-pastoral sector, the economic contributions of mobile livestock farming for the decentralised communities, etc.

The trained journalists are currently producing more than 100 radio programmes on various themes for broadcast in West Africa. In addition, PEPISAO intends to continue training in the other Western and Eastern corridors with more than forty journalists. More than 200 radio programmes will thus be added to the platform to make agro-pastoralism better known in West Africa.