THE PLACE OF ANCIENT AGRICULTURAL PRACTICES AND TECHNIQUES IN YEMEN TODAY:
The essentially rural economy of Yemen is based on an ancestral savoir-faire in the field of agricultural practices and techniques, and the management of natural resources. Undoubtedly the most stirring testimonies of this tradition are the archaeological vestiges of large-scale, hydraulic construction works, dating from the pre-Islamic period (with the Mareb dam as a symbol) and the surviving terrace systems built on the steep slopes of mountains.
Yemeni farmers are justifiably proud of the indigenous knowledge they have elaborated over the centuries, nourishing the legend of 'Arabia Felix'. Today, however, this knowledge seems to be threatened by the deep crisis Yemen's agriculture is undergoing: degradation and exhaustion of natural resources, a high population growth rate threatening food security, endangered food crops. These are some of the major challenges that have appeared during the last decades.
How did Yemen's farmers in ancient times manage the available natural resources while preserving them for all these centuries? What practices and techniques did they elaborate? What is remaining today of this indigenous knowlege? What is its place in contemporary Yemeni agriculture, which is continuously confronted with increasing social and economic constraints? Finally, can this body of local agricultural knowledge meet the demands of new agrarian realities?
The Faculty of Agriculture of Sanaa University, the French Embassy's Cultural and Co-operation Section, the French Centre for Yemeni Studies, the Yemeni Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation and the Social Fund for Development organised a seminar that opened up discussions and offerd preliminary responses to these questions. This seminar was held June 18-20, 2000. It featured contributions from researchers and field workers of various backgrounds:
- archaeologists, ethnologists and geographers, academics specialists of these ancient and contemporary practices,- field workers, confronted with the concrete problems of present Yemeni agriculture and sometimes forced to devise emergent solutions to them.
The seminar took place in the Faculty of Agriculture, in the French Centre for Yemeni Studies and in the French Cultural Centre. Its aim was double:
- to open up discussions and to exchange ideas between specialists of various backgrounds, on the most delicate problem Yemen is undergoing today: the agricultural crisis.- to make students as well as members of national and international institutions involved in rural development, more sensitive to the traditional agricultural knowledge. Its transmission to new generations can be endangered by the introduction of new techniques and methods which are misused or unsuitable for today's new social and agrarian realities.
Five main themes composed the seminar:
- the origin, domestication and selection of adapted crops, in the specific Yemeni environment,- the control and the preservation of scarce natural resources (water and land),
- the laws and rules governing these ancient agrarian practices and techniques,
- the impact of the introduction of new technologies on this savoir-faire,
- the possible contribution of the ancient agricultural savoir-faire to a sustainable development.
Each cycle of lectures was followed by discussions about the whole theme. One other day was devoted to several round-tables that opened up discussions and offered ideas for solutions to the deep crisis Yemeni agriculture is undergoing today.
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