Question 5 - Past Year Questions - 5 Marks - Chapter 5 Class 9 History - Pastoralists in the Modern World - History

Give reasons to explain why the Maasai community lost their grazing lands.

Answer:

Points to remember

The Maasai community lost their grazing land for the following reasons:

1. European imperial powers scrambled for control over Africa dividing the region into colonies .
2. The grazing lands were taken for white settlement and the Maasai were pushed into a small area .
3. Maasai lost 60 per cent of their lands .
4. The British encouraged local peasants to expand cultivation .
5. Pasturelands were turned into cultivated lands .
6. Large areas of grazing lands were turned into game reserves .
7. Pastoralists were not allowed to enter these game reserves .

Answer to be written

The Maasai community lost their grazing land for the following reasons:

1. As European imperial powers scrambled for control over Africa in the late nineteenth century, the region was divided into colonies . An international boundary was established between British Kenya and German Tanganyika in 1885 , cutting Maasailand in half .
2. The best grazing lands were gradually taken over for white settlement and the Maasai were pushed into a small area in southern Kenya and northern Tanzania . They were limited to an arid zone with uncertain rainfall and poor pastures .
3. The Maasai lost about 60 per cent of their pre-colonial lands . 
4. From the late nineteenth century, the British colonial government in east Africa encouraged local peasant communities to expand cultivation .
5. As cultivation expanded , pasturelands were turned into cultivated fields . 
6. Large areas of grazing land were also turned into game reserves like the Maasai Mara and Samburu National Park in Kenya and Serengeti Park in Tanzania .
7. Pastoralists were not allowed to enter these reserves , they could neither hunt animals nor graze their herds in these areas.

(Any Five)