A paper written by Ellis Adams, associate professor in the Keough School of Global Affairs and Kellogg faculty fellow, entitled "Farmer–herder conflicts in sub-Saharan Africa: drivers, impacts, and resolution and peacebuilding strategies" recently won the editors choice award for the journal Environmental Research Letters.
Environmental Research Letters is a peer-reviewed journal that aims to bridge the gap between research and policy communities focusing on environmental change and management. The editors choice is a distinction awarded to highlight particularly impactful and high-quality research articles published within the journal.
Adam’s paper looks at the ways in which resource scarcity and insecurity from climate change, alongside ethnic, religious, and identity politics, have strained the relationship between farmers and herders in West and Central Africa over recent decades. Significant security threats have now arisen in the Sahelian and savannah dryland regions due to violent farmer-herder conflicts.
Adams reviews empirical studies on farmer-herder conflicts in sub-Saharan African published in the 21st century to focus holistically on the drivers, impacts, and limits of the main resolution and strategies used to manage conflicts. These findings advance understanding of farmer-herder conflicts and establish opportunities and limitations within various resolution approaches.
Ellis Adams an associate professor of geography and environmental policy in the Keough School of Global Affairs. He specializes in environmental policy; water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH); water policy and governance; gender, water, and development; cities; political ecology; and sub-Saharan Africa.