The nature of indigenous environmental knowledge production: evidence from Bedouin communities in...

THE NATURE OF INDIGENOUSENVIRONMENTAL KNOWLEDGE

PRODUCTION: EVIDENCE FROM BEDOUINCOMMUNITIES IN SOUTHERN EGYPT

JOHN BRIGGS1*, JOANNE SHARP1, HODAYACOUB2, NABILA HAMED2 and ALAN ROE1y1University of Glasgow, Scotland, UK2South Valley University, Aswan, Egypt

Abstract: The use of indigenous knowledge has been seen in some quarters to offer real

possibilities of success in development practice. However, results have been uneven, perhaps

because of the way in which indigenous knowledge has been conceptualised. Drawing on

empirical research among two related Bedouin communities in Egypt, the paper suggests

that indigenous knowledge is provisional and dynamic and therefore rather less static than

implied in much of the literature; it should be seen as utilitarian and grounded, both

economically and socio-culturally; and indigenous knowledge as a term may be unhelpful

and misleading and would be better expressed as local knowledges. Copyright # 2006 John

Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Keywords: indigenous knowledge; local knowledges; Bedouin; Aswan; Egypt

1 INDIGENOUS KNOWLEDGE AND DEVELOPMENT

Many development practitioners, including even the World Bank (World Bank, 1998), see

the use of indigenous knowledge as having real potential for promoting sustainable rural

development. Similarly, several more theoretical ‘alternative development’ approaches

also imagine the use of indigenous knowledge as the basis for progress at the local level

(e.g. Escobar, 1995). However, there are problems with this use of indigenous knowledge,

partly because of the way in which it has been only partially understood at the local level,

and partly because of the unhelpful ways in which it has sometimes been conceptualised

more generally. This is not to suggest that the content of various indigenous knowledge

Journal of International Development

J. Int. Dev. 19, 239–251 (2007)

Published online 28 November 2006 in Wiley InterScience

(www.interscience.wiley.com) DOI: 10.1002/jid.1337

*Correspondence to: J. Briggs, Department of Geographical and Earth Sciences, University of Glasgow, Glasgow,G12 8QQ, UK. E-mail: [email protected] Roe was formerly with University of Glasgow, UK.

Copyright # 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

systems is not relevant. It clearly is. However, the difficulty in development practice is that

indigenous knowledge can be highly place-specific and therefore difficult to deploy more

widely; consequently, its value as a practical development tool has been questioned (e.g.

Briggs and Sharp, 2004). This paper attempts to go some way in addressing this issue by

investigating the ways in which indigenous environmental knowledge is (re-)produced,

evaluated and re-worked, by drawing on empirical field evidence among two related, but

geographically separated, Bedouin communities in southern Egypt. It further attempts to

suggest ways in which a potentially useful indigenous environmental knowledge may be

reconceptualised and hence be more valuable in development practice.

In some ways, frustration at the less than successful current deployment of indigenous

knowledge in development practice is reflected in much of the literature, a literature which

tends to focus on three broad themes. In this literature, issues related to the nature and

epistemology of indigenous knowledge are not always directly or effectively addressed (for

a fuller discussion, see Briggs, 2005), and it is this which leads to problems of indigenous

knowledge deployment. The first theme concerns itself with the content of different

indigenous knowledge systems. Early interest particularly focussed on indigenous

technical knowledge (e.g. Richards, 1985; Critchley et al., 1994; Scoones and Thompson,

1994), perhaps because indigenous technical knowledge was most readily adaptable to

possible change and improvement. Subsequent interest expanded into vegetation and soil

resources (e.g. Goodman and Hobbs, 1988; Briggs et al., 1999; Klooster, 2002). Most

interest, though, has focussed on soil quality and classification, in, for example, Latin

America (Guillet, 1989; De Queiroz and Norton, 1992), Africa (Ostberg, 1995; Kundiri

et al., 1997) and Papua New Guinea (Sillitoe, 1996), among many examples.

The second theme has focussed on the interface of indigenous and scientific knowledge,

and the ways in which indigenous knowledge may be deployed in the interests of

development. This includes debates on the binary divide between indigenous and western

knowledges, suggesting that a reconciliation between the two may be difficult at best

(Howes and Chambers, 1979; Pretty, 1994; Haburema and Steiner, 1997; Briggs et al.,

1998; Sillitoe, 1998; Ellen and Harris, 2000; Homann and Rischkowsky, 2001; Oudwater

and Martin, 2003; Payton et al., 2003). Such a discontinuity, however, is not really

surprising, as the very different traditions and epistemologies of indigenous and western

knowledge systems tend to lead to them being treated as discrete entities, something which

results in them being precluded from dialogue and learning (Mohan and Stokke, 2000).

Indeed, Ericksen and Ardon (2003) perceptively observe that farmers develop soil

knowledge very much in the context of their main concern of agricultural production,

whereas soil scientists take a more holistic view of plant productivity, the implication being

that there is little commonality between the two approaches.

Somewhat related, the third theme concerns debates over the intellectual challenges in

the production and use of indigenous knowledge. To conceptualise indigenous and western

knowledge systems as a binary misses the point; there is no simple binary, and hence a

hybridised knowledge system evolves which meets the utilitarian needs of a particular

group in particular circumstances (Bell, 1979; Bebbington, 1993; Agrawal, 1995). It is also

the case that indigenous knowledge is considerably more dynamic and ever-changing than

sometimes acknowledged, either explicitly or implicitly (Sillitoe, 1998; Kalland, 2000).

Crucial issues related to the contextualisation of indigenous knowledge (Bebbington, 1993;

Ellen and Harris, 2000; Jewitt, 2000; Myers, 2002; Pottier, 2003) and to the power relations

associated with it (Hoben, 1995; Roe, 1995; Leach and Mearns, 1996; Cleaver, 1999;

Novellino, 2003), have also been of considerable interest.

Copyright # 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. J. Int. Dev. 19, 239–251 (2007)

DOI: 10.1002/jid

240 J. Briggs et al.

However important these debates, they reflect rather less interest in the empirical

processes of indigenous knowledge acquisition and production, what might be thought of

as an epistemology of indigenous knowledge. Indeed, Reij et al. (1996) observe that much

of the emphasis of indigenous knowledge research has tended to focus on the content of soil

and water conservation techniques, for example, rather than necessarily on understanding

the basis of the problems and knowledge per se. Niemeijer andMuzzucato (2003) similarly

observe that the focus on taxonomies of indigenous knowledge has tended to divert

attention from the theorisation of indigenous knowledge production. Consequently,

indigenous knowledge is all too often implied as being static, with insufficient attention

paid to deeper and more dynamic understandings of its change and development. In an

attempt to explore these issues further, this paper will focus on the processes of indigenous

knowledge production, rather than specific content, with the intention of developing a more

conceptual view of indigenous knowledge by addressing some of the key epistemological

issues associated with it.

The research was conducted among two Bedouin communities in southern Egypt, living

in two different geographical areas about 180 km apart (Figure 1), and therefore

experiencing different natural resource environments. The first community is located in

Wadi Allaqi in a hyperarid, relatively remote desert environment; hence the Bedouin are

still very dependent on a well-developed environmental knowledge to survive. It is

important to recognise that this group is starting to experience some economic changes,

however slowly at the moment, particularly in terms of better access to the markets of

Aswan. This has come about following the recently constructed asphalt road which comes

Cairo

LakeNasser

100 km

E G Y P T

Aswan

S U D A N

River

Nile

Nile ValleyBedouin

AllaqiBedouin

Figure 1. The location of the two field sites


DOI: 10.1002/jid

Indigenous Environmental Knowledge Production 241

within 15 km of their settlements. This means that sheep can now be transported to Aswan

by pick-up over 3–4 hours, rather than being driven by foot over 3–4 days, with a

consequent improvement in condition. This has clear implications for potential increases in

sheep production, and therefore, how resources might be managed differently. The second

community comprises Nile Valley Bedouin around the city of Aswan. This group is

permanently settled in a rather different physical environment, inevitably with different

environmental challenges. They still identify themselves culturally as Bedouin, however,

including those born here rather than in the desert. For them, economic change is much less

significant, as they are engaged in a well-established Nile agriculture system in which a

large body of accumulated knowledge and experience has been built up over many years.

The data were collected through a series of extended discussions/interviews with

participants, taking place at monthly intervals (sometimes more frequently) with

16 participant groups, over a period of just over 12 months. This provided a long-term,

detailed perspective on indigenous knowledge issues. Similar questions and topics

provided the focus for the discussions, and these were routinely re-visited on subsequent

visits, not only for triangulation purposes, but also to determine the ways in which the

prioritisation of environmental knowledge changed seasonally. The data were entered into

NUDIST Nvivo for subsequent coding and qualitative analysis.

2 THE PROVISIONAL AND DYNAMIC NATURE OF INDIGENOUS

KNOWLEDGE

In some quarters, there has developed a view of indigenous environmental knowledge as

somehow ‘being out there’, a view which Maddox et al. (1996) provocatively frame as one

of a romanticised ‘Merrie Africa’, in which an indigenous knowledge somehow operates in

harmony with nature. The challenge for development practice, therefore, is how to capture

this knowledge and then use it to promote a sustainable rural development. However, in

such representations, indigenous knowledge tends to be cast as static and timeless.

Empirical evidence from this study demonstrates that this is far from the case. Indigenous

knowledge is much more dynamic, provisional, transitory and highly negotiable, even in

relatively remote communities. Both Bedouin groups re-work environmental knowledge,

constantly adding to it and discarding existing knowledge which has been superseded or

become irrelevant. All talked about how environmental knowledge is constantly acquired,

tested and re-worked, even if this is only to confirm what is already known. Second-hand

information is not trusted without being first tested and even experienced. A Bedouin

woman commented that, although she might hear about the grazing value of particular

desert plants from other people, she regarded this as ‘unsubstantiated’ information and she

would always test out the information for herself. First-hand experience produces

knowledge that an individual never forgets, she argued. Another commented that

‘environmental knowledge is about observation, experiment and only then knowledge’.

Secure knowledge about preferred grazing species is frequently developed from

observations of animals’ feeding behaviour and subsequent growth rates. Such a re-

working and re-evaluation of knowledge is a slow and careful process. It has to be. For

Bedouin living close to the margins, they have rather more to lose if they get things wrong.

The Bedouin also demonstrate an inherent dynamism in indigenous knowledge

acquisition. Recently established commercial farms along the shore of Lake Nasser in

Wadi Allaqi have provided a previously unavailable opportunity for grazing. Bedouin


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observed that their sheep preferred these residues to other grazing types, and various

arrangements for access to these grazing resources were made with the cultivators.

Encouraged by this, a Bedouin woman fed her livestock a range of other cultivated feeds as

a controlled experiment, the results of which showed that her livestock preferred berseem

hejazi (lucerne) rather than another variety, berseem baladi, as the latter contained a higher

proportion of water in relation to feed matter. It was only after harvest residues had become

available that these new environmental knowledges developed, based on a combination of

observation, experimentation and experience. Significantly, because it was a woman who

had led these experiments, this resulted in a degree of women’s empowerment within the

community. Indeed, this empowerment was subsequently further reinforced by the use of

shilbeika, an aquatic plant found in Lake Nasser, for animal feed (for a fuller discussion,

see Briggs et al., 2003; Sharp et al., 2003). Unknown in Allaqi before the construction of

the Aswan High Dam, it was noted that sheep ate dried shilbeika washed up on the lake

shoreline. Some women then collected shilbeika, dried and fed it to sheep, an experiment

that was successful and generated new knowledge. The current use of shilbeika is seen to be

very much the product of women’s efforts, and, indeed, for many men, the suitability of

different varieties of the plant, and how much they should be dried before being fed to

sheep, is still largely unknown.

Implicit in the romanticisation of indigenous knowledge is the sense that indigenous

environmental management is somehow ecologically harmonious, and that indigenous

resource management will necessarily promote sustainable development (Jackson, 1993;

Jewitt, 2000). While this may well be the case, it is not always so, as sometimes groups

must take actions to facilitate their own survival. In Allaqi, some changes are forced, such

as the restrictions on winter hill grazing resulting from several consecutive years of

drought. A consequence has been the emergence of extreme grazing pressure in parts of

Wadi Allaqi, as there are no alternative sources of grazing available. Other literature

suggests that indigenous knowledge is protected as a central part of identity. While this

may be the case in the most general terms here (many we spoke with indicated the

importance of knowledge of the desert for Bedouin identity), the Bedouin are highly

pragmatic about the knowledges they hold. For instance, although young Bedouin women

in Aswan have little or no knowledge of acacia management, a central element of Bedouin

life in the desert, this did not concern them. As there is no acacia where they now live, they

did not need to retain this knowledge and were not at all bothered about discarding it.

Instead, they have developed a good working knowledge of date palms, trees that are now

central to their livelihood. Clearly, ‘indigenous’ knowledge is adapted to deal with these

new resources, and new hybrid knowledges have emerged from these opportunities.

3 THE SOCIO-ECONOMIC GROUNDING AND UTILITARIAN NATURE

OF INDIGENOUS KNOWLEDGE

A key element in understanding indigenous knowledge production is the way in which the

process is grounded in the changing socio-economic conditions of the communities

involved. If a particular knowledge has a value in contributing to the household economy, it

will be used and re-worked. If it has no or only limited value, it will be replaced and

subsequently forgotten. An Aswan Bedouin, for example, said that he has now forgotten

what he once knew about dry farming, because it is less efficient and provides no

worthwhile commercial output, compared to irrigated Nile Valley farming. For


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environmental knowledge to have a value for this man, it must contribute to enhancing

production, a markedly utilitarian view. Another Aswan Bedouin shrewdly suggested that

‘all people had different knowledges depending on their current activities and previous

experience’. Those who are now permanently resident around Aswan, possess less of an

environmental knowledge of the desert, than those living in Allaqi. Indeed, in the Nile

Valley, it is clear that much Bedouin traditional environmental knowledge, related to

previously important desert livelihoods, has disappeared, and in only one generation in

many cases. The notion of a reservoir of commonly accepted, unitary Bedouin indigenous

environmental knowledge is untenable.

The dynamism of economic activity ensures that knowledge must adapt to changing

economic circumstances and opportunities. One informant was well aware of the fact that

his environmental knowledge repertoire, and that of his two sons, was changing and

adapting to new circumstances. His sons knew virtually nothing related to the

environmental resource base of the desert areas beyond Allaqi itself, because the

household had chosen not to migrate there for several years to use the resources. Thus, the

sons had not had the opportunity to observe, evaluate and work with the upstream plants

and grazing resources. Even the knowledge base of the man himself was being eroded

through lack of engagement. Two reasons explain this. First, the drought which has

affected the Eastern Desert for the last 5 years has discouraged migration and encouraged a

greater use and development of alternative shoreline grazing resources along Lake Nasser

in Wadi Allaqi. This raises the interesting question, however, as to whether such changes

may be permanent. Despite Bedouin enthusiasm for the resources around the lakeshore,

there is still a preference for hill area grazing resources among some. Should the drought

end and the hill pastures return, it is entirely possible that at least some Allaqi Bedouin will

revert to their seasonal migration patterns there. However, the longer that this migration

fails to take place, the more likely that the environmental knowledges of such areas will

gradually disappear, and especially so among younger people for whom these areas are

steadily becoming economically irrelevant. Already, at least one family has become quite

content with the more sedentary life in Wadi Allaqi, and the advantages of easy access to

lake water and the Aswan market. This family talks about building a permanent home, at

which point a return to seasonal migration patterns elsewhere in the desert will be even less

probable. Knowledge of these grazing resources is then likely to be lost forever.

Second, and more importantly, major economic change has been caused by the creation

of Lake Nasser. This has made possible reliable lakeside cultivation, using water directly

from the lake, as well as the availability of reliable seasonal grazing for livestock around

the lakeshore as the annual flood recedes. New environmental knowledge has developed to

exploit these opportunities, within the constraints of the available resources, both

environmental and economic. Consequently, there has developed among the younger

generation something of a knowledge vacuum concerning traditional grazing areas and

other resources in the wider desert. An Aswan Bedouin accepted that he is much less aware

of the natural environment than his father. He now has less need for a knowledge of desert

pastures and resources; his environmental knowledge base is now confined to activities

related only to his job of driving camels. Elsewhere among Aswan Bedouin, environmental

knowledge is now largely equated with agricultural knowledge. Other non-agricultural

knowledges are rarely mentioned and are not particularly valued, even when they are

recalled, re-emphasising the socio-economic importance and utilitarian nature of

indigenous environmental knowledge. As market activities become increasingly important

within household economic reproduction, a marked tendency has developed to re-work and


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evaluate environmental knowledgewithin households, on a more active and regular basis to

meet these changing demands.

This has been exacerbated by greater numbers of Aswan Bedouin children attending

school. Formal education emphasises agriculture and agro-pastoral production systems,

rather than natural resource-based grazing systems. Hence, there has been an erosion of

environmental knowledge among these children. Even in Allaqi, where there is no formal

school education, children’s indigenous knowledge is also being reduced. For example, an

Allaqi Bedouin commented that his son had not had the opportunity to learn the direct route

from Sayalla to Um Ashira (two important locations in the desert) because ‘the days of

camel travel were over’. Pick-up trucks are the new camels, and his son’s knowledge

reflected this; as his father dryly put it: ‘he can tell you the owner of any passing pick-up. . .and as long as there is a track he will not get lost’.

For Bedouin, the success, or otherwise, of indigenous knowledge in contributing to

sustainable development requires that it must be firmly embedded within the economic and

socio-cultural structures of the communities and households involved. Economic context is

central. Those Allaqi families with the wealth to afford camels exhibit a wider knowledge

base than those who do not. Those owning a sufficient number of camels, for example, can

take livestock to graze on lakeshore agricultural residues, something unavailable and hence

unknown to poorer families without the economic resources in the form of camels to travel to

these farms. Knowledge and wealth are clearly linked, to the extent that such a link suggests

that notions of indigenous knowledge need to be firmly grounded in economic analyses.

However, the economic is not the only important context. Social and cultural contexts

are also highly significant. Sedentarisation is creating new social roles within the family

and thus also different knowledges. Knowledge is to a large extent controlled by

experiences that accrue with age and, due to the different spatial extents of men and

women, gender. The concept of gender is used here carefully, recognising that there are

different groups of men and women in the household whose knowledge and decision-

making power are differentiated. Within those more sedentary Bedouin families, the extent

of women’s environmental knowledges may be changingmuchmore profoundly than those

of the men. Women’s work, and the knowledge required for it, is determined by their

location. If the resources needed for household reproduction are located close to the

household itself, then women would have developed a knowledge of them; if resources are

located further afield, in more overtly male spaces, women’s knowledge is much less well-

formed, or even non-existent. This impacts not only on women’s knowledges, but also on

those of the entire family. Women are responsible for the early education of children up to

the age of 10–12 years (as they stay around the household and are thus looked after by

women), which means that women’s more restricted environmental knowledges tend to

reduce children’s early environmental education in scope. Thus, sedentarisation, and the

greater involvement with market economies that has followed, has meant that somewomen

have seen their roles as environmental knowledge experts actually reduced, notwithstand-

ing the comments made above about some other women feeling more empowered through

successful grazing experimentation.

4 INDIGENOUS KNOWLEDGE; OR LOCAL KNOWLEDGES?

The results from among the Bedouin of this study suggest that the term ‘indigenous

knowledge’ may not be particularly appropriate or accurate. Indigenous environmental


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knowledge is provisional, dynamic and evolutionary, and a key part of this process is the

acquisition of knowledge from outside the community. Even in remote communities, such

as those in Allaqi, outside information and knowledge filters in. This may be through

visitors to the area; return migrants who have spent extensive periods of time away from the

area, but have now returned on a permanent basis; visits made by Bedouin from the area to

urban markets such as at Aswan; Bedouin individuals or groups who arrive from different

areas and so on. In other words, there exists a range of different sources of information, all

of which may be evaluated in different ways, and to greater or lesser extents, by the

Bedouin.

Although family and kinship contacts are crucial to environmental knowledge

acquisition, external, non-family sources of information can be equally crucial. Many

talked about acquiring information through friends, neighbours and acquaintances

throughout their adult life, and about exchanging information and knowledge sometimes

on an almost daily basis. Allaqi Bedouin women talked about discussions with Nubian

women, whom they meet when visiting Nile Valley relatives. Such meetings have resulted

in information about seeds, types of soil, planting and harvesting times being absorbed by

Bedouin. Allaqi Bedouin men spend considerable periods of time talking with a range of

‘outsiders’, including incomer lakeshore farmers in Allaqi itself, Nile Valley farmers on

their often frequent visits to Aswan and men passing through Allaqi. Aswan Bedouin

similarly recognise the importance of ‘external’ sources of environmental knowledge.

Even though these respondents are culturally Bedouin, they acknowledge that, since their

settlement in the Nile Valley, they have learnt a great deal from their Nile Valley farmer

neighbours (unlike Allaqi Bedouin who talked about a cultural gap between Bedouin and

Nile Valley farmers). Particular knowledge has been acquired on soil types and

management, and the best grazing types for optimum sheep production. One informant

readily accepts that his environmental (and other agricultural) knowledge has been derived

principally from talking to people and gleaning information from them. A key point which

distinguishes this group of Bedouin from those in Allaqi is the extent to which they actively

seek out new knowledge and information. It is unclear whether this stems from the fact that

they are relatively recent arrivals in the valley, and are, therefore, obliged to seek out new

knowledge from longer term residents here to compensate for their own lack of local

knowledge, or whether the more overt market nature of rural production in the valley

requires a more continuous re-working of local knowledge to maximise output.

The problem with the term ‘indigenous’ is that it implies that knowledge is internal to

that community or household, that it has developed and evolved only within that

community and that it is unaffected by the outside world. Whilst much of the knowledge

held by people in this study may indeed be indigenous, in the sense that it has passed

through the generations within the family, much of it is also derived from outside. This does

not mean that people are not uncritical of such sources of knowledge, but they are willing to

consider, evaluate and adopt such knowledge as part of a broader environmental knowledge

repertoire, but only if it makes environmental, economic and socio-cultural sense to do so.

The environmental knowledge base, therefore, rather than being conceptualised as an

indigenous knowledge, can be more usefully conceptualised as a mediated, local

knowledge. This local environmental knowledge acknowledges that place is important, in

that useful and accurate environmental knowledge can change over relatively short

distances; what is useful and accurate in one location is no guarantee that it will be useful

and accurate in another. But it also acknowledges that such knowledge comprises a hybrid

of various knowledge sources which are evaluated, re-worked and deployed in the interests


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of household reproduction. Hence, Bedouin environmental knowledge is not something

simply internal to this group, but has long been influenced by contact with various groups,

including Nubians and other farmers in the Nile Valley, as well as with a myriad of people

with whom Bedouin engage at market places and elsewhere. This clearly challenges the

notions of a binary divide between indigenous knowledge and western science, expressed

in some of the literature, which suggests that there is somehow an indigenous knowledge

pitted against awestern science knowledge. In reality, Bedouin knowledge is mediated by a

range of outside influences. This does not mean the loss of indigenous knowledge, merely

the re-working of current knowledges into a form more appropriate to particular

environmental, economic and socio-cultural circumstances.

There is also a problem with the use of ‘knowledge’ in the singular, implying a shared

understanding of knowledge within a community, village or even a household. There is,

however, an unevenness in environmental knowledge; some people’s knowledge is

different, limited and/or partial, compared with knowledge held by others. In the Nile

Valley, there are people who indeed retain an environmental knowledge of the desert

because it supports their sheep production activities, whereas there are others who have

forgotten this as they are now full-time cultivators, even though they may be of Bedouin

descent. What is apparent is that there are multiple environmental knowledges. This does

not mean that people necessarily hold radically different, conflicting and opposing

knowledges about the environment, but that they typically retain different emphases with

regard to that knowledge and how it is subsequently deployed. The content and depth of

environmental knowledge is uneven across both communities and households, suggesting

that the concept of a (singular) community knowledge is unhelpful. Within any community

there exists a range of knowledges, rather than a singular knowledge, and this range is

based on access to different environments, issues of wealth and mobility, experience, age

and gender. This is something of which the Bedouin are keenly aware. The existence of

experts within the community, whom people can consult on matters ranging from medical

help to way-finding guidance through unfamiliar parts of the desert, illustrates Bedouin

recognition of the unevenness of knowledge within their own communities. It is important,

therefore, to recognise the existence of plurality of knowledges within communities and

households, rather than to retain a conceptualisation of a unitary knowledge.

5 CONCLUSIONS

A number of general conclusions can be suggested in the light of the above discussion. It

appears to be the case that if local environmental knowledges are to contribute successfully

to sustainable development practice in a meaningful way, it is vital that their use in policy

and planning is grounded in the economic and socio-cultural environments in which they

are found. Local environmental knowledges are not neutral, disembodied or ‘out there’

waiting to be found. This study has demonstrated the ways in which environmental

knowledges, across two different communities, are nonetheless firmly grounded in their

economic and socio-cultural realities. It is clear that as these realities change and modify,

so do local environmental knowledges in response to them. If the incorporation of

indigenous knowledges into sustainable development strategies is to be successfully

achieved, then such strategies must be sensitive to the form, complexity and nuances of

such changes. This, in turn, creates an important challenge for development practitioners in


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the sense that there is a need for caution in assuming that such indigenous knowledges can

be unproblematically deployed in the interests of sustainable development.

The notion that there exists a shared, consensual community knowledge also needs to be

re-assessed. The results of this study unequivocally demonstrate that the depth and range of

environmental (and other) knowledges vary within communities and even within

households. There is no such thing as a community knowledge. Instead, there exist

different levels, ranges and depths of knowledges within any community, and these have to

be somehow incorporated in any development planning or implementation. This does not

mean that there may not be shared knowledges, as indeed there are, but that the extent to

which these exist and are accepted within communities as a consensus needs to be

considered very critically. Equally, it is also clear that economic diversity within

communities, and even within extended households, can have a significant impact on the

type and depth of environmental knowledge. In essence, poorer households have fewer

resources to risk in testing, experimenting with and developing new knowledges. Any

sustainable development plan trying to incorporate local knowledges, but without dealing

with this issue of economic differentiation, is likely to be very limited in its likelihood of

success.

Finally, there is a clear need to re-conceptualise the term ‘indigenous environmental

knowledge’ rather more as ‘local environmental knowledges’. This is not just a semantic

change for the sake of it. It reflects the complexity of such knowledges as hybridised,

pragmatic, utilitarian and transitory, and not as some static, romanticised, never-changing

wisdom, with the challenge being for development practitioners to tease out such

knowledge from communities as the development answer. To attempt to do such is

meaningless. Regrettably, reality is far messier than this latter view implies, and such an

approach is nothing more than an illusion. The results of this study demonstrate that a

‘pure’ indigenous knowledge rarely exists and the term ‘indigenous environmental

knowledge’, although used as the widely accepted shorthand, is far less appropriate than

‘local environmental knowledges’. The latter picks up both the nuances and subtleties of

the multiple sources of such knowledges, and the multiple nature of environmental

knowledges within communities and households. It is clear that the groups involved in this

study receive knowledge and information from multiple sources and do not simply rely on

some kind of traditional knowledge entirely indigenous to the Bedouin. This raises

important questions about what exactly indigenous knowledge is, and how it can be more

usefully conceptualised, both in theoretical as well as practical terms. The term

‘indigenous knowledge’ suggests an unchanging body of knowledge quite separate from

other knowledge systems. The results of the research reported here, however, suggest

otherwise.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We are very grateful for the field assistance and expert inputs given to us by Hatem Mekki

and Haythem Ibrahim. We are equally grateful to the Department for International

Development (ESCOR, now Social Science Research Unit) for the award of research

grant R7906 to allow us to undertake this research. Thanks are due to Mike Shand of the

Department of Geographical and Earth Sciences, University of Glasgow for preparing the

map and to two anonymous referees for their helpful comments and observations which

helped in the revisions to this paper. Finally, thanks are due to Professors Ahmed Belal and


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Irina Springuel of the Unit for Environmental Studies and Development, South Valley

University, for providing support and facilities in Aswan, and in the field in and around

Wadi Allaqi.

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