Pastoralism

The practice of raising and husbanding domesticated quadrupedal livestock, typically sheep, goats, cattle, horses, or other animals. Pastoralism may be conducted either on a subsistence level, where stock are kept for the needs of the owner and family, or on a commercial scale, where large numbers of animals are herded on large tracts of land, eventually to be slaughtered and processed for the market. Many groups who are pastoralists are also nomadic and may engage in transhumance, a practice common in mountainous regions, in which herds of animals are moved between lower and higher elevations on a seasonal schedule. In other cases the migration of humans and animals involves a regular rotation among traditional grazing lands, which are abandoned once the animals have consumed most of the available vegetation. A key distinction between pastoralists and hunters and gatherers is that the animals associated with pastoralism are domesticated and live in close proximity to the herders, sometimes even sharing the same structure for shelter.

Non-commercial pastoralism is typically viewed in the context of cultural ecology as an adaptation to natural conditions that prohibit the development of complex agricultural systems. Conditions are either too dry (the Sahel region) or the growing season too short (northern Scandinavia, Siberia) to produce sufficient food for the population, and domesticated livestock then become the main source of calories in the diet. Moreover, the livestock when slaughtered may provide clothing, weapons and tools, and other items essential to the survival of the pastoralists. Pastoral groups may be classified on the basis of the dominant type of livestock they raise, or on the geographic region they typically occupy.