Project Abstract

<p> Pastoralism is the most traditional of ruminant livestock production<br>systems in which extensive movement of the animals in search of pastures<br>and water is its salient feature. Whereas the system is adapted to<br>exploit the dry, arid climatic zone, it often overlaps into wetter,<br>agricultural land, occasionally ending up into violent conflicts.<br>Ranching is practically the intensive form of pastoralism but it has a<br>weakness of being seen as antisocial and needing high initial capital.<br>Whatever other truly improved system of exploiting the pastoral<br>agro-ecosystem, it seems it seldom can indict sedentarized tendencies<br>and rarely can it be less intensive than ranching. This study<br>investigate the problems and prospect of cattle ranching in Nigeria. <br></p>

Project Overview

<p> </p><p><strong>INTRODUCTION</strong></p><p><strong>1.1 &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;</strong><strong>Background of the study</strong></p><p>Ranching is a very significant change of the pastoralist system<br>strategy. It changes the mobility nature of pastoralism where<br>traditionally there are no limits of grazing of the available pastures,<br>into controlled grazing. It also changes the common property character<br>of the pastoralist land where all land is open for pastures without any<br>individual ownership. Ranching is now the dominant system of ruminant<br>livestock production in North America, Australia and parts of South<br>America. This is because the advantages of cattle ranching and it<br>importance cannot be over emphasize Some European systems could also be<br>described as ranching, though enclosures are often small and animals are<br>frequently given supplements in the field (Ibid). In countries like<br>United States, (Ibid), communal grazing pastoralism was prevalent in the<br>19th century, but now the grazing systems are fully enclosed (Ibid)<br>From 1990 to 2003, the cattle herd in the Northern part of the country<br>grew by 140% from 26.6 million to 64 million heads. Increasing demand<br>and the sector’s advantages in the region suggest that ranching will<br>continue to grow in the region. Nevertheless, the growth of extensive<br>ranching in the region is worrying especially because of increased<br>deforestation. Scientific and modern economic intervention into<br>pastoralism has generally targeted the mobility and communal grazing<br>characteristics of the system which results into sedentarized and most<br>likely the enclosed, ranching system. This intervention has implication<br>that the pastoralist ecosystem is a limited and valuable resource. The<br>traditional pastoralist perception is contrary to this implication, and<br>considers and wishes to consider that pastoral land is essentially vast<br>wilderness with no instituted limitation of use (no use limits except<br>the availability of pastures). This obviously contradicts most<br>intervention outlook. Even with most prominent advocates for promotion<br>and improvement of pastoralist resource exploitation strategy, the<br>baseline seems somewhere to be based on sedentarization or predictable<br>location prior to other proposed measures like nutritional and<br>veterinary assistance for livestock, services such as education<br>(schools) and health; and setting up emergency grazing areas [Ibid].<br>There has been extensive scholarly analysis of the livelihood and<br>sustainability of pastoralism as a way of life of a significant<br>proportion of the human population. Much criticism exists arguing that<br>mobility of large herds of livestock is stressful to the environment as<br>it would cause extensive removal of vegetation. Repeated uncontrolled<br>grazing often ends up into bare land where vegetation is completely<br>removed. Due to livestock trampling topsoil of an area usually becomes<br>much pulverized while the immediate subsoil beneath becomes severely<br>compacted. Pulverized soil is prone to extensive loss of soil through<br>wind erosion while when it rains sheet erosion sweeps away very easily<br>most of the pulverized soil. The surface run-off becomes much enhanced<br>by the compacted soil condition. Therefore, while rainfall would be<br>stimulant for vegetation re-growth, because of extensive vegetation<br>removal and compaction the rainfall instead becomes an enhancer of<br>bareness of the soil after washing away all the soil that would support<br>vegetation re-growth. In the Sahel in Africa, it has been reported that<br>vegetation removal by livestock in the area is believed to have<br>increased soil surface albedo to the extent of causing reduction of<br>rainfall and rapid desertification. The worst thing about the unlimited<br>mobility is that it can extend its impact beyond limits. Another<br>criticism on pastoralism is centered on the system’s tendency against<br>limited use rights of pastureland In this context all pastureland is<br>communal and open to limitless grazing. Since communal use of<br>pasturelands prevents any sense of ownership of the land, no individual<br>pastoralist can think of expansion of his activities within the locality<br>in which he is existing at any particular time. At the same time the<br>pastoralist cannot intuit any idea of intensification because under<br>communal ownership there is no ground on which this intensification can<br>be exercised. Under the communal setup, for example, a pastoralist<br>cannot think of possibility of substituting some of the livestock for<br>more pasture land. This is the dilemma of the communal land tenure<br>system of traditional pastoralism. In his much referred “Tragedy of the<br>commons”, criticizes very categorically the communal grazing<br>characteristic of pastoralism and insists privatization as a way to<br>correct imbalances of the pastoralist practice. In his article he<br>described how common property resources shared by pastoralists<br>eventually become over-used and ruined. He argued that the pastoralist<br>land use strategy is unstable and a cause of environmental degradation.<br>Earlier more than a century ago, also criticized pastoralism and argued<br>observing that as far as common grazing land is concerned there is<br>everything against it. He asserted that where there is communal grazing,<br>every peasant in the village would tend to maximize the opportunity<br>within the same limited area, with the result that grazing lands become<br>always overstocked, never given rest, and usually become little more<br>than exercise grounds for cattle (Ibid). Facts about this are difficult<br>to totally refute even though some more recent literature elaborate<br>contrary opinion and argue for a more interdisciplinary apprehension.</p><p><strong>1.2 &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;</strong><strong>STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM</strong></p><p>When ranching was introduced, the economic contribution of the<br>livestock was the major consideration. This consideration relegated the<br>multiple functions and non-economic uses of livestock, which might be<br>more important to the Fulani. Ranching capitalized on enhanced<br>production output, but overlooked the potential use of animals as<br>self-reproducing wealth, symbol of prestige, medium of social exchange,<br>and insurance policy (Cisse 1980; and Schneider 1981). A major policy<br>mistake was that of failing to understand that traditional pastoralism<br>was an important source of food and employment on a continuous basis to<br>most of the household members (Sandford 1982; and Cossins 1983). It is<br>against this backdrop that the researcher intends to investigate the<br>problem and prospect of cattle ranching in Nigeria</p><p><strong>1.3 &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;</strong><strong>OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY</strong></p><p>The main the objective of the study is to ascertain the problem and<br>prospect of cattle ranching in Nigeria. To aid the successful completion<br>of the study, the researcher intends to achieve the following specific<br>objective;</p><p>i) &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; To ascertain the problem of cattle ranching in Nigeria</p><p>ii) &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; To examine the merit of cattle ranching in cattle production in Nigeria</p><p>iii) &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; To evaluate the relationship between cattle ranching and cattle production in Nigeria</p><p>iv) &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; To examine the role of cattle ranching in reducing communal clashes</p><p><strong>1.4 &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;</strong><strong>RESEARCH HYPOTHESES</strong></p><p>The researcher formulates the following research hypotheses to aid the successful completion of the study;</p><p><strong>H0: </strong>there is no significant relationship between cattle ranching and cattle production in Nigeria</p><p><strong>H1: </strong>there is a significant relationship between cattle ranching and cattle production in Nigeria</p><p><strong>H02: </strong>cattle ranching do not play any significant role in combatting communal clashes in Nigeria</p><p><strong>H2: </strong>cattle ranching do play a significant role in combatting communal clashes in Nigeria</p><p><strong>1.5 &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;</strong><strong>SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY</strong></p><p>It is believed that at the completion of the study, the findings will<br>be of great importance to the house committee on agriculture and<br>federal ministry of agriculture as the study seek to enumerate the<br>numerous benefit of cattle ranching over open grazing as this will help<br>in policy formation, the study will also be of importance to the<br>security operative as the findings of the study will help them<br>strategize to curb the menace of herdsmen farmers conflict in Benue<br>state, the study will also be useful to researchers who intend to embark<br>on a study in a similar topic as the study will serve as a reference<br>point to further studies. Finally, the study will be of great importance<br>to reporters, academia’s, students, teachers and the general public as<br>the study will add to the pool of existing literature and also<br>contribute to bank of knowledge in the subject matter.</p><p><strong>1.6 SCOPE AND LIMITATION OF THE STUDY</strong></p><p>The scope of the study covers cattle ranching problems and prospect<br>in Northern Nigeria, in the cause of the study, there are some factors<br>which limited the scope of the study;</p><p><strong>a) AVAILABILITY OF RESEARCH MATERIAL:</strong>&nbsp;The research material available to the researcher is insufficient, thereby limiting the study &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; </p><p><strong>b) TIME:</strong>&nbsp;The time frame allocated to the study does<br>not enhance wider coverage as the researcher has to combine other<br>academic activities and examinations with the study.</p><p><strong>c) Finance</strong>: the finance budgeted for the study was a<br>major constraint to the scope of the study, as the researcher has<br>limited resources at his disposal to combine both research work and<br>other academic engagement.</p><p><strong>1.7 OPERATIONAL DEFINITION OF TERMS</strong></p><p><strong>Cattle</strong></p><p>Cattle colloquially cows are the most common type of large domesticated ungulates. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae, are the most widespread species of the genus Bos, and are most commonly classified collectively as Bos Taurus</p><p><strong>Ranch</strong></p><p>A ranch is an area of land, including various structures, given<br>primarily to the practice of ranching, the practice of raising grazing<br>livestock such as cattle or sheep for meat or wool.</p><p><strong>Crisis</strong></p><p>A crisis is any event that is going to lead to an unstable and<br>dangerous situation affecting an individual, group, community, or whole<br>society</p><p><strong>1.8 ORGANIZATION OF THE STUDY</strong></p><p>This research work is organized in five chapters, for easy understanding, as follows</p><p>Chapter one is concern with the introduction, which consist of the<br>(overview, of the study), statement of problem, objectives of the study,<br>research hypotheses, significance of the study, scope and limitation of<br>the study, definition of terms and historical background of the study.<br>Chapter two highlights the theoretical framework on which the study is<br>based, thus the review of related literature. Chapter three deals on the<br>research design and methodology adopted in the study. Chapter four<br>concentrate on the data collection and analysis and presentation of<br>finding. Chapter five gives summary, conclusion, and recommendations<br>made of the study.</p> <br><p></p>