Why mobile Indigenous cultures matter for climate policy

What is it about?

For many Indigenous communities, migration is a way of life rather than a problem to be solved. This article looks at four mobile groups: Fulani herders and Guet Ndar fishers in Senegal, Nyangatom agro-pastoralists in Ethiopia, and Moken sea nomads in Thailand. Based on fieldwork in early 2025 in all four places, it shows that their movements follow rain, tides, winds and stars, and carry rituals, social roles and generations of knowledge about the environment. Climate change and projects meant to protect nature or support development, such as tree-planting schemes, marine protected areas, dams and national parks, increasingly restrict this mobility and put both livelihoods and cultural heritage at risk.

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Photo by Yi Wu on Unsplash

Photo by Yi Wu on Unsplash

Why is it important?

Climate policy and heritage protection tend to assume that people stay in one place and that heritage is a building, a site or a monument. Mobile communities fall outside this picture, so their cultural losses often go unrecorded and uncompensated, and well-meant adaptation projects can make their situation worse. This article shows that economic and cultural losses cannot be separated for these groups: losing a grazing route or a fishing ground also means losing status, knowledge and identity. Taking mobile cultures seriously helps avoid harmful policies and treats Indigenous knowledge as a source of insight for climate adaptation.

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