Fiery Field School: Teaching and Learning in Rural Ethiopia

Utah State University grad student Eric LaMalfa called his recent trip to East Africa "the most spectacular journey I've ever been on."

LaMalfa, who earned a bachelor's degree in rangeland resources from Utah State and is currently working toward a master's degree in ecology, traveled to southern Ethiopia's Borana Plateau earlier this year to present the short-course "Use of Prescribed Fire in Rangeland Management" to pastoralists and government employees.

His trip was part of the Pastoral Risk Management (PARIMA) project, initiated in 1997 by Layne Coppock, associate professor in Utah State's College of Natural Resources' Environment and Society Department. The PARIMA project focuses on promoting economic independence and improving the lives of rural Ethiopians. Five universities in the United States and Kenya, as well as an extensive African network of partnerships, are involved in the project.

Some 10 million Ethiopians live in the country's arid rangelands, said LaMalfa, and most are pastoralists whose survival depends on herding livestock, including cattle, sheep, goats and some donkeys and camels.

Encroaching settlement and maize production on savannah rangelands, drought, population growth and overgrazing threaten the traditional pastoral way of life, which the Borana people have practiced for centuries.

"They have tons of indigenous knowledge about animals, plants and how they interact, but they lack resources," he said of the semi-nomadic people, who live in walled villages of small grass huts. Each night, livestock are brought into the village walls to protect them from wild predators.

LaMalfa said the Borana people traditionally used fire in the savannahs to clear brush, but governmental policies have banned burning in recent decades. The result is less grass for grazing, replaced instead by thick invasive brush, including the pervasive Acacia drepanolobium with "really nasty spines."

"Nothing can get through it, not people, livestock or wildlife," said LaMalfa of the acacia, also known as whistling thorn tree.

Accompanying the dense native shrubs are miserable infestations of disease-carrying ticks, mosquitoes, fleas and tsetse flies.

LaMalfa met with Borana elders from villages near the Kenyan border to discuss the reintroduction of prescribed burning to help reclaim precious rangelands.

"The elders agreed that the effort was worthwhile," he said. "But they were concerned about using fire under current conditions."

The elders noted that persistent drought, increased settlement and the establishment of new farm plots made traditional burning practices dangerous. Taking recent social and ecological changes into consideration, the elders, LaMalfa and local government administrators crafted safety measures and restrictions. Memories of a devastating wildfire season in 2001 were fresh on meeting participants' minds, and LaMalfa heard detailed stories of fighting fires that persisted for three months and scorched acres of land.

Preparations completed, LaMalfa led the first fire demonstration near the remote village of Alona. Excitement was high as LaMalfa and students, accompanied by curious villagers, gathered in the early morning, when the humidity was at its height.

"We cleared a fire line about 10 meters wide around the area we intended to burn," he said. "Then the designated people lit the fire using drip torches filled with diesel fuel."

During the initial and subsequent burn trials, participants learned about fire behavior and how to implement the elements of a fire plan, including use of wind and fire suppression methods to accomplish objectives. During the climax of one trial, a section burned with "impressive intensity," said LaMalfa. "Excitement filled the faces of the class and the community."

As training progressed, he turned leadership duties over to student "burn bosses," who ably assumed fire management tasks.

"As I watched the successful trial, I realized this was a highlight of my fire career," said LaMalfa, "I saw the results of collective planning and effort and watched students manage prescribed fires on their own."

Despite his role as teacher, LaMalfa said the project taught him more in three weeks than the years he's spent in the classroom. "It really changed my whole outlook on natural resources."

He noted that the challenges faced by rural Ethiopians - drought, non-native plant invasions, isolation from social services and government, limited clout in the marketplace, private development of public lands, diminishing grazing resources and lack of educational and employment opportunities for youth – are not so different from those faced by rural residents of the Intermountain West.

"The difference is the problems are much worse in Ethiopia," said LaMalfa. "Pastoralists are losing the potential to restore natural systems, and their resources are so scarce."

Acknowledging villagers' needs while realistically tempering his expectations to the resources at hand was a challenge. "We, in the United States, have so much and they have so little," LaMalfa said. "Even the change in this student's pocket seems like a lot over there."

Writer: Mary-Ann Muffoletto, (435) 797-1429

Contacts: Eric LaMalfa, 435-797-0194; Layne Coppock, 435-797-1262