THE ABYEI DEVELOPMENT PROJECT: A CASE STUDY OF CATTLE HERDERS IN THE SUDAN (PRODUCTION, HOUSEHOLD, DINKA).

摘要

The central thesis of this study is that African cattle are integral in the cultural, social, and economic lives of many African peoples, yet most of the existing development schemes pertaining to Sub-Saharan Africa focus on crop production that is export-oriented, a focus that may be appropriate for many cultural settings and development goals. This study examines how to integrate the livestock component into the existing development models by explicitly recognizing the importance of cattle in the overall farming enterprise on the argument that such an extended model will yield more appropriate development policies, particularly with regard to rural community development in Southern Sudan.;Conceptually, the Ngok Dinka households are assumed to combine community resources with households' time in the production of basic commodities that enter their utility functions. This necessitates a model that focuses simultaneously on resource allocations both at the community and the household levels. Budgeting and planning programming were used at the community level, while linear programming (LP) techniques were utilized at the household level. In this way the interdependencies between the household and the community were elucidated as manifested by the institution of cieng (unity and harmony) which is embodied in the communality of the Dinka Land Tenure System. This, in essence, means that science and modern technology are called upon to provide, in the transition, a development model that combines the positive aspects of the traditional-indigenous modes of production with the positive aspects of an imported model. It is hoped that through this combination of the traditional-indigenous and imported models, the dignity and human values of the Ngok Dinka people can be maintained, and they can enthusiastically participate in the development process, rather than being alienated by that process.;Marginal physical product of labor was found to be greater than zero under the three technologies hypothesized in this study.;The extended model was used to evaluate the Abyei Project proposed for the Ngok Dinka people, an agro-pastoralist society in which cattle have historically been, and continue to be, an integral part of the fabric of daily life.