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People
and
Livestock
Issue 6, September 2007
Page 2 of 8










Experiences in participatory innovation development
Promoting local innovation on the Tibetan plateau
Rangeland Enclosure on the Tibetan Plateau Project
Yan Zhaoli and Ann Waters-Bayer
The Chinese government is allocating rangeland on the Tibetan plateau to individ-
ual families, and promotes settlement and fencing there. An EU-funded project,
Rangeland Enclosure on the Tibetan Plateau, examines the impacts of these poli-
cies on the environment and pastoral wellbeing. It combines participatory and con-
ventional socio-economic and bio-physical research to incorporate local knowledge
and concerns. It is identifying and evaluating both endogenous and introduced in-
novations ­ especially how people adjust to changes in land tenure and access to
resources. ICIMOD (the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development)
coordinates the project's work on participatory approaches, co-management and
options for change in collaboration with ETC EcoCulture.
Two initial workshops on rangeland co-management and local innovation took place
in Chengdu and Hongyuan in July 2007. Before the first, participants from research
institutes and universities in Sichuan, Qinghai and Gansu provinces and Tibet
Autonomous Region recorded herders' innovations. At the workshop, the partici-
pants learned about local innovation and participatory development, and how to fa-
cilitate multi-stakeholder workshops. In the second workshop immediately after-
wards, they practised their new skills with men and women herders and people from
extension services, development projects, local government and the women's fed-
eration.
Here are some examples of local innovations identified at this workshop:
·
A herder family in Waqui Township, Hongyuan County, buys 1-year-old yaks in
winter, fattens them, and sells them for meat the following autumn (normally
yaks are sold at over 4 years of age).
·
Many herders in Hongyuan have started to supplement the winter diet of weak
yaks by stirring wheat flour into water (some add chopped hay) or making dough
with a little salt.
·
Ms Gebo, a herder in Masa Village, Qiongxi Township, has revised the fencing
on her land to separate summer, autumn and winter pasture. That allows her to
manage a rotational grazing pattern.
Travellers in Hongyuan County cannot miss another innovation: "Pastoral Happi-
ness". Some families have pitched fancy tents along the main road to attract tourists
who want to experience pastoral culture and food, and to ride horses around the
tents.
The workshops encouraged the participants to document and analyse their innova-
tions. These innovations will inspire others and will act as entry points for participa-
tory research to find ways to improve the incomes and lives of herder families. This
approach to participatory innovation aims to strengthen the position of herders in
research, development and policy dialogue.
Along with ICIMOD and ETC, other partners in the Rangeland Enclosure on the Ti-
betan Plateau project include the Chengdu Institute of Biology, Lanzhou University,
Qinghai Academy of Animal and Veterinary Science, the Tibet Academy of Agricul-
tural and Animal Sciences, Oxford University, the University of Tromso, and the
Macaulay Institute.
More information: Ann Waters-Bayer (waters-bayer@web.de) or www.retpec.eu
A two-step process to
help people to learn
how to record and pro-
mote local innovations