Consequences for Maasai pastoralists of changing water access regimes in the Greater Amboseli ecosystem, Kenya
Among the Maasai group ranches surrounding Amboseli National Park in southern Kenya, perennial springwater from the foothills of Mt. Kilimanjaro generates an oasis effect in an otherwise water-scarce landscape; it underpins pastoral livelihoods, agricultural productivity, and wildlife conservatio...
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| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Water Alternatives Association
2025-02-01
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| Series: | Water Alternatives |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.water-alternatives.org/index.php/alldoc/articles/vol18/v18issue1/774-a18-1-8/file |
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| Summary: | Among the Maasai group ranches surrounding Amboseli National Park in southern Kenya, perennial
springwater from the foothills of Mt. Kilimanjaro generates an oasis effect in an otherwise water-scarce landscape;
it underpins pastoral livelihoods, agricultural productivity, and wildlife conservation economics. This resource,
however, is increasingly under pressure from these competing interests. Based on semi-structured interviews,
waterscape mapping workshops with Maasai pastoralists, field observations, and visual interpretations of highresolution satellite images, we map, describe and analyse how 70 years of uncoordinated proliferation of water
extraction, conveyance, and storage features across the semi-arid savanna rangelands has altered the local water
cycle and changed power dynamics around water resources. A succession of externally driven rural development,
land reform and conservation policies has contributed to the reshaping of patterns and regimes of access to water
by modifying land ownership and attracting new activities such as crop irrigation and safari tourism. As a result, the
status of water is shifting from a common-property resource with a tradition of sharing, to a commodified resource
that is controlled privately and redistributed according to individualistic strategies. Our focus on three hydrosocial
territories from a Maasai perspective examines how high densities of private structures such as wells and small
runoff- and pipeline-fed storage reservoirs are pushing the livestock-based, semi-nomadic economy towards
intensive, sedentary agriculture. Inequalities in access to water have deepened, with water users associations and
other water management organisations also experiencing or generating new forms of conflict between resident
communities.
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| ISSN: | 1965-0175 |