Pastoralism at the crossroads: between struggles and recognition
Pastoral ecosystems are found in areas with the most extreme agroecological conditions on the planet. There, since ancient times, pastoralist communities have adapted livestock husbandry to the cycles of nature, producing food, stewarding biodiversity, and sustaining life where others cannot.
Today, climate change and deepening environmental crises are making life and production in these territories increasingly difficult. Meanwhile, pastoralist communities face escalating violence, dispossession, and displacement driven by land grabbing, extractivist projects, infrastructure expansion, industrial agriculture, and even conservation schemes imposed without free, prior, and informed consent.
In response, pastoralist organizations around the world are building powerful alliances, reclaiming collective control over lands and commons, developing innovative strategies and forging scientific collaborations that center—rather than erase—local and ancestral knowledge. Together, communities and allies are producing evidence to confront corporations that plunder community resources and demanding binding policies and rights that protect pastoralist peoples and territories.
In this context, the declaration of 2026 as the International Year of Rangelands and Pastoralists is an important recognition of the crucial role pastoral ecosystems and pastoralist communities play in sustaining life on the planet. This year should go beyond mere recognition. It must become a political turning point—a moment to confront ongoing injustices, deliver long-denied rights, and amplify the struggles, knowledge, and transformative power rising from pastoralist communities across the world.
World Alliance of Mobile Indigenous Peoples & Pastoralists (WAMIP)
