Pastoralists from across Horn of Africa to gather at UN-sponsored debate

20 November 2007 – More than 550 Ethiopian pastoralists and representatives from communities in neighbouring Kenya, Djibouti and Somalia will gather next week at a five-day meeting organized by the United Nations to discuss how to devise more sustainable futures for the inhabitants of the impoverished region.

The event, the largest ever gathering of pastoralists in the Horn of Africa, will be held from 28 November to 2 December in Hudet in Liben zone of Ethiopia’s Somali region and is scheduled to coincide with a visit to the region by the Emergency Relief Coordinator, John Holmes.

The gathering’s team leader Allistair Scott-Villiers said “it represents a remarkable and unique opportunity for pastoralists’ leaders to discuss critical issues that affect the lives of millions.”

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) is organizing the gathering in response to a high-level discussion in Addis Ababa on 1 November on the region’s humanitarian and development situations