The Terroir Approach to Natural Resource Management: Panacea or Phantom -- The Malian Experience
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Date
1995
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Abstract
"In recent years the 'terroir approach' to natural resource management has become increasingly popular in Sahelian countries. It has been promoted by the World Bank, while at the same time it is practised by many NGOs and praised by most governments. The first World Bank-supported project based on this approach was initiated in Burkina Faso in 1985, and similar projects now exist in several Sahelian countries including Mali (since 1990) and Niger (since 1994). Many NGOs have in the same period broadened the scope of their activities from a fairly limited focus on technical improvements such as soil and water conservation to an approach based on organisational support to the management by local communities of a wide range of resources of importance to their livelihood.
"In the general debate about the terroir approach there has been a tendency to associate it with bottom-up grassroot initiatives implying a real transfer of authority from government structures to civil society. It has sometimes been described as the convergence of the resource management issue and those of decentralisation and democratisation. Hence, many Sahelian governments such as the Malian refer to terroir experiences as concrete manifestations of their will to redefine the relationship between the state and civil society."
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IASC, resource management, indigenous institutions, decentralization, local participatory management