Conservation and Development

That the vegetation of the island is the hub around which pastoralists and their animals revolve, the very bedrock upon which their continued existence rests, is evident. Soqotran pastoralists have a high degree of respect for the vegetation and a clear understanding of the value to them of preserving the equilibrium between human and livestock numbers on the one hand and the vegetation on the other. The islanders intimate knowedge of the flora, their controlled exploitation of it, and their understanding of their environment as a whole has, over generations, given them an enviable independence, and has surely played no small part in forming their distinctive culture with its ethos of sharing, tolerance, co-operation and courtesy.

However, the island has been undergoing a period of transition and the many recent changes are likely to effect the hard-won equilibrium between man and environment. The recurrent political upheavals and wildly fluctuating prices of recent years have resulted in noticeable disruption to the traditional balance between exploitation of the vegetation on the one hand, and its conservation on the other. Mutually agreed and mutually binding rulings governing land owership and rights to water, to pasture, to the enclosing and cultivation of land, have now undergone many permutations and seem likely to remain unsettled for the foreseeable future. In such an atmosphere of uncertainty, it is evident that formerly successful strategies for peaceful co-operation and internal settling of disputes are foundering, and increasing recourse is being had to outside agencies to settle disputes, often according to land-use systems and traditions not necessarily relevant or beneficial to the island. Livestock numbers are very much the key to the continued survival of the vegetative cover: that these numbers already approximate to those which vegetation and available water can support is demonstrated by the fact that numerous animals die during periods of drought. Herd numbers are thus still controlled by shortage of fodder and water and by the total absence of veterinary care, with herds being frequently ravaged by the rapid and uncontrolled spread of infectious disease. However, these parameters can all too quickly be altered: by the introduction of new water resources, for instance, or effective veterinary care, or the introduction of subsidised supplementary feed (as has happened with disastrous consequences to the vegetation in nearby Dhofar). Already on Soqotra the increased number of pastoralists choosing to settle in the major coastal villages plus the availability of new sources of cash income have led to a smaller number of herders looking after a greater number of livestock in joint herds supported by wage earners on the coast. In some parts of the island signs of overgrazing seem now to be appearing, in particular in the vicinity of the larger coastal settlements, and, as more people leave full-time herding, their childen display considerably less understanding of and respect for the island vegetation. The frequent shortages of alternative fuels combined with the rapid growth of coastal villages and the establishment of new settlements close to the new graded tracks in areas where suitable firewood is scarce, poses a clear threat to the vegetation. The island is also undergoing a building boom as, influenced by standards of housing witnessed on the mainland, or by comments passed by visitors on their older more simple accomodation, islanders are leaving their former dwellings and building new more spacious houses. This is obviously a desirable development, but in the absence of building materials other than those provided by the island's woodland, it puts the continues existence of that same woodland in yet further jeopardy. Imported woods are expensive even when available, and the temptation to lop branches and cut down trees irresponsibly and in breach of both traditional and govement regulations - especially on the part of those no longer fully involved in or dependent on the pastoral way of life - is great. Development on the island, if it raises the standards of life and health of the islanders and increases their freedom of choice is greatly to be desired, but unless such development is truly sustainable, and those in charge of introducing such development are fully and continuously aware of the overriding and supreme importance of the flora to the island in terms of the long-term survival of its inhabitants, both human and animal, the results could be ultimately disastrous: any damage to the present fragile balance between livestock, man and vegetation is likely to be irreversible and could have the tragic consequences of reducing Soqotra to a desert island.