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One weekday afternoon. 1967. First, a here coffee for my mother, then one for me. The small cup fit perfectly in my hand. Our first coffee ceremony. After the first round, abolish, for pleasure, more water was added to the damned, the earthenware pot and boiled again. The second round our, was to think and contemplate, and then the third, baraka, for blessing or praise.
I had hopped, hopped, and walked behind my mother for a couple of hours from the mission compound to the little thatched round. hammer of one of his patients. My mother, a midwife who ran a mission clinic, had been called in the middle of the night to deliver her patient’s baby, shoulder first, a few weeks earlier. We walk along the winding spiral road through the cool green rainforest, then down a soft dirt road, full of bare feet, donkeys, mules, oxen, sheep and goats, around rows of corn of it height than my mother, and fields of teff grass as tall as my knees – I was a tall kid during my not-seven years – and then finally to the hammer surrounded by a plantation of tall, thick, single-stemmed fake bananas enset 10 meter tall trees and real bananas with the sweetest small bananas in the world, cane cabbage gomenand sweet potato, onion, garlic and carrot.
And transplanted coffee trees from the nearby forest.
Wild coffeeCoffea arabica) in the Kafa area of southwestern Ethiopia, is famous for its spices and honey, and for being the birthplace of coffee. Because the topography of Kafa is dominated by steep hills, gorges and streams, there are regional and local differences in the coffee landscape. This means that there is a wide range of diverse and unique flavor profiles.
Ethiopia has the world’s main repository of genetic diversity for Arabica coffee. However, it is estimated that 43 percent of the forest was lost between 1988 and 2008 due to resettlement and migration, timber extraction, forest grazing and conversion to agricultural land. And climate change. At least 60 percent of all wild coffee species are now threatened with extinction.
One response has been to find a way to reconcile the needs of the local population with conservation pressures through the formation of the Kafa Biosphere Reserve. Covering an area of 760,000 hectares, it was admitted to the World Network of Biosphere Reserves in 2010. Since then, a series of projects managed by the German NGO NABU include: reforestation areas with native tree species; training of park rangers for the protection and management of the forest; innovative marketing of forest products; ecological agriculture; ecotourism; education and research; and ecological diversification of the Ethiopian orchard coffee value chain.
Arabica coffee flowers, Bonga, southwestern Ethiopia (Aaron Davis, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew)Our recent article (co-authored with Abinet Shiferaw, Befikadu Taye and Zegeye Woldemariam), ‘Landscape multifunctionality in (and around) the Kafa Biosphere Reserve: A sociocultural and gender perspective’ explores the role of the local community in traditional resource management.
The first case study describes the long history of ecological wisdom and conservation narrated by the Shatto through music as a form of culture and knowledge preserved in sacred places, water sources and forests. The Shattos identified themselves as popular musicians who came to Ethiopia with Menelik I, son of King Solomon of Israel. Shattorasho – Chief of all Shattos and their delegates, Shattegudo – collectively mobilized as music professionals in the palace of the Kingdom of Kafa, around the nobility and within communities. On victorious occasions in the kingdom, Shattorasho, facilitated the chants and praised the heroic deeds of the king and the glory of the kingdom.
Shattos discouraged social and ecological crime and encouraged environmental conservation by narrating the history and spirits of the forest, knowledge and practices around sacred places and forests, including water points through songs, expressions oral and poetry. People were strictly prohibited from entering and felling trees in dense forests (Share-Show) as these areas were directly under the jurisdiction of the Kafa kings. As this knowledge runs the risk of being lost, we suggest that the Shattos were like oral historians who had knowledge and information as agents of socialization of Kafa’s identity, culture and history using folk music. Exclusion or minimal alteration in the central areas of the Biosphere to protect nature Coffea arabica could be rephrased as similar to Share-Show.
In the second case study, we examined deejjoo, a thanksgiving sacrifice ceremony associated with the management of natural forest resources. The practice of dove deejjoo The ritual sacrifice was performed in the depths of the Kafa forests, which are sacred places for the Kafecho people. The Kafecho people believed in Yeero, an almighty God, creator of the Universe, and specific clan spirits called Exactly, which is an intermediary spirit that connects people with Yeero through the mediator Allaamo. Most of Kafa’s forest resources are associated with these spiritual beliefs. Qoolloo deejjoo, the spirit of the forest inhabited the forest, bushes, running water and mountains. Together, these ritual practices maintained a close link between people and forest resources and the conservation of biodiversity and prevented deforestation. Other forms of traditional resource management were kobbo (large forest areas managed through customary rights); general (cultural forests used for worship, sacraments and prayers); Y finger (large trees where prayer or religious ceremonies are held).
Significant changes in government policies and external forces that result in large-scale deforestation and environmental degradation have reduced the number of participants from dove deejjoo overtime.
We also examine gender-specific factors and how the individual interaction of women and men in (and around) the Biosphere produces and reproduces gender spaces and places. We suggest that there has not been a real understanding of gender-specific factors in land use management and decision-making processes.
We describe how Shatto’s elders, all males, passed on information about forest values through music, oral expressions and poetry to their children. Shatto women were mainly engaged in domestic activities. From time to time they performed at public events when there were funeral ceremonies for public figures, accompanying the funeral with expressions and popular dances. There was a socialization at home about Shatto’s identity for the girls, but they were never independent folk practitioners. Indeed, there was no room for Shatto’s women as popular practitioners.
As with the male Shatto, women did not participate in deejjoo celebrations, but provided food and drink for Thanksgiving ceremonies.
Both the traditional approaches described above and the contemporary approach to biosphere management have taken for granted the roles and responsibilities of women as caregivers, thus reinforcing gender stereotypes. The gender division of labor and the exclusion of women from all these management approaches have led to a male-centered notion of how the rainforest is (or was) maintained. This vision has been reinforced in part by development projects that provide energy-saving stoves, train women in regional crafts such as pottery or other projects they can run from home such as beekeeping or raffia weaving.
A focus on gender could accurately represent, recognize and support the reality of women’s lives in (and around) the Kafa Biosphere Reserve and could also contribute to the management of natural resources as well as the sustainability and resilience of Ethiopia’s coffee sector.
Damned (coffee maker) (Ruth Jackson)So when I think of my first here of coffee more than 50 years ago, I remember that an invitation to have coffee is a symbol of friendship, respect and hospitality. Performing the coffee ceremony is almost mandatory in the presence of a visitor, whatever the time of day. Making and drinking coffee is a daily routine, prepared by women, that builds relationships and provides a platform for regular conversation. The role in Landscape research it is probably my last academic work. I want to remember how much I have gained doing research with women in Ethiopia and mark the occasion with coffee.
