ETHIOPIA: Ogaden livestock traders hit hard by ban

WARDER, Ethiopia, 24 November (IRIN) - A traditional watering point near the Somali border, southeastern Ethiopia, this tiny desert town in the Ogaden was once a huge trading centre for camels, sheep, goat and cattle. Now, only a few bleating sheep and goats can be found tethered to market pens in vast sandy clearings around the town used before to accommodate the unruly herds. When the Gulf States slapped a Rift Valley fever ban on all livestock imports from the Horn of Africa region in October, crisis hit the Ogaden.

"There is no market at all now," said one of Warder's biggest livestock traders, Zeinab Sheikh Muhammad Khalif. "All the livestock we bought for export we are now holding, and we have nowhere to sell."

Zeinab sits in a desolate mood in a tea shop and talks prices. Like most livestock traders in the Ogaden, she buys and sells for export. Before the ban she was selling goats, sheep, camel and cattle up to two or three times a month through the Somali ports of Berbera and Bosasso.

"Sometimes we sell 500-1,000 heads a month, sometimes more... I sell them to Somalia and also exchange them for food stuffs, like sugar, rice and flour," she told IRIN. On top of the losses incurred in buying the livestock, Zeinab is also loosing money fast on paying people to look after the herds and buying water to keep the animals alive.

The internal market is insignificant compared to the export one. Even the type of livestock differs according to which market they are meant for. Smaller, cheaper goats and sheep known as "dubaax" are bought and slaughtered on a tiny scale.

"There is nothing else I can do for now... There is really not much trade and business going on in Warder. The ban has affected everyone, from the one with one bag of rice up to those with more than 50 goats and sheep," Zeinab laments.

The ban was imposed first by Saudi Arabia - the main export market for animals from the Ogaden - and was taken up by all the Gulf States. Its impact here has been significant in the Ogaden, which is struggling to recover from the effects of a three year drought. Livestock is the backbone of the pastoralist economy, in a region closely tied to Somalia. The livestock kept in the Ogaden constitutes one of the largest herds in Africa, Mark Bidder from the UN Ethiopia Emergency Unit told IRIN.

Deputy governor of the Ogaden town of Kebre Dehar, Muhaamad Hirsi Farah, told IRIN that with the ban following hard on the heels of a major food crisis this year "recovery looks impossible". During March and April "people died on the streets... and the livestock lay down and died on the land." Many moved to urban centres, particularly Gode, the capital of the Ogaden, and survived on aid. "Those who have a few animals left can put them out to pasture now, but many have lost everything... those who do have herds left can't sell them," said the deputy governor.

Kebre Dehar livestock trader Muhammad Hasan Hargen told IRIN he had little to do these days, as he had lost most of his livestock earlier in the year: "Before the famine I had about 60 camels, 50 head of cattle and about 220 sheep and goats. Now I have only 20 camels, three cows and about 50 sheep and goats." He said he used to take the animals across the border and trade in neighbouring Hargeisa, capital of the self-declared state of Somaliland, northwest Somalia, and Burao. So intimately linked are the economies of the Ethiopian Somali Region and Somalia, that the traders use the Somali shilling in preference to the Ethiopian Birr. "Now I hear on the radio there is a ban on our livestock because of Rift Valley fever... the Arabs have stopped the entire trade," Muhammad Hasan Hargen lamented.

In Warder, Zeinab says it is the responsibility of the regional and central government in Ethiopia to get the ban lifted. A testing system is necessary to establish that the animals for export are not infected, she insists. The livestock ban is as big a crisis as the drought, she says. "The drought is an act of God, and you can only pray for God to bring rain....but the ban is an act of man, and that is worse because it destroys your livelihood but no help comes".