HINDOU OUMAROU IBRAHIM

Drawing on indigenous peoples’ knowledge to map resources and mitigate conflict in Chad

Lake Chad, in the Sahel region of west-central Africa, provides water for more than 30 million people living in the surrounding countries of Chad, Cameroon, Niger, and Nigeria. But its waters have almost vanished in barely two generations. Together with increasing population sizes, this has exacerbated tensions between nomadic Mbororo herders and settled farmers. A charismatic climate activist and advocate for indigenous rights, Hindou Oumarou Ibrahim is convinced that the best way to manage the conflict is by bringing people together to map out resources and see better how they can share them. Conducted on a participatory basis with local communities, Ibrahim’s project utilizes the knowledge gained from these practices to create two-dimensional mapping on a board of natural features such as ridges and plateaus. This will then lead to the creation of intricate 2D or 3D landscape models that will inform decisions about the distribution and sharing of the land and resources such as fresh water and fruit trees. Ibrahim has already conducted a small-scale mapping project in Baïbokoum, southwestern Chad, and demonstrated that it is a sustainable, scalable, and credible tool for decreasing tensions between communities and helping local authorities to implement a smart way of governance. The Rolex Award will permit her to scale up her mapping work in Chad and neighboring countries. “I am trying to see the real solutions for the people and helping them to better understand what they have as opportunities, which is the traditional knowledge that they own,” Ibrahim says. “We all depend on nature, we depend on the environment. We interact with the environment. I can’t work protecting human rights without protecting the environment.”