Special

Article 3

Building on the Indigenous in Combatting
Emerging Global Challenges

By Hassan Omari KayaIntroduction
Since the breakup of the Soviet Union and the widening gap ofwealth around the world, there has been heightened tension in many
regions, which has spread further with the 9.11 terror attacks in the
United States in 2001, the “War on Terror” in Afghanistan and Iraq,
and more recently the rise of China and its power struggle with
Western countries. Climate change and the Covid-19 pandemic are
just two examples of global challenges that have made the current
already unstable politico-economic situations more complicated.
These challenges show the need for mankind to make full use of all
types of knowledge and wisdom to come up with solutions. One of
the “glocal” (thinking globally and acting locally) solutions, which
will be the focus of this article, is the role of Indigenous Knowledge
Systems (IKS). IKS are bodies of knowledge, technologies,
innovations, beliefs and value systems which are culturally andecologically specific, produced by local communities for sustainablecommunity livelihood. They encompass areas of health, education,
food and nutritional security, natural resource management,
environmental management and climate change adaptation,
peacebuilding, conflict transformation, leadership and governance.
The important thing to recognise is that these cultural diversities
exist everywhere, including within the United Kingdom, continental
Europe, Japan, Korea and China. Each has its own diversity ofindigenous knowledge, including languages and value systems,
which communities use in all aspects of life to mitigate different life
challenges. The focused theme in this article is particularly on IKS in
Africa (AIKS) which needs to be recorded in written form before it
becomes too late, so that AIKS could contribute to the solutions ofglobal challenges in co-operation with the rest of the world. One of
the crucial factors for sustainable development, which tends to be
marginalised by Western developmental paradigms and strategies inAfrica, is the institutional framework of culture. Relatively speaking,while other world regions including East Asia had the opportunity toconceptualize and integrate their cultural, linguistic and philosophicalvalue systems with Western development policies, the Westernmodels of African development have tended to view African culturalvalues as limitations to socio-economic development. Sustainable
development in Africa, however, cannot be advanced effectively
without taking into consideration the socio-economic and cultural
realities of African societies as they are and not what other nonAfrican cultures want them to be.
Africa is a continent covering 30 million square kilometres with
42 Japan SPOTLIGHT • May / June 2021

AuthorHassan Omari Kayadiverse IKS based on over 2,000 distinct languages and cultures, 54
countries and a population of over 1.2 billion. This indicates that theAfrican continent is exceptionally rich in ecosystem-specificknowledge systems. Current Western ways of looking at knowledge
tend to be limited to explicit knowledge that can be written. However,similar to other indigenous knowledge bases from around the world,
AIKS are often tacit and exist in different ways such as oral
knowledge, and artistic or spiritual forms, and are more holistic.
While the harnessing of big data and the use of Artificial
Intelligence (AI) may seem to hold solutions to many global issues
where electricity and digital infrastructure are readily available, it isimportant to realize that much of the knowledge and wisdom passed
over generations is actually not recorded, and recorded knowledge isbiased towards certain types of knowledge and languages. It is
becoming increasingly known that the latest technologies such as AI
cannot fulfill their potential when the data they are based on is biased
in the first place. Furthermore, AIKS, again similar to otherindigenous knowledge from around the world, tend to be held among
the older generations and as these are not recorded, if no effort ismade, when those generations are gone, this knowledge would begone with them forever.
In the search for sustainable solutions to global challenges suchas climate change and global pandemics such as Covid-19, AIKS
could be interfaced with other knowledge systems for sustainability
and enrichment of the global knowledge pool. The following
examples illustrate the use of IKS in the diversity of African
ecosystems.

Use of AIKS-Based Climate Change Early Warning
Systems & Indicators
Studies in various parts of the continent indicate that many ofAfrica’s intellectual resources built on centuries of engagement withnature remain undocumented. The diversities of vocabularies andvalues contained in associated indigenous languages have essential
information about ecosystems, including soil-water systems, plant
and animal phenologies. This knowledge is often represented inmyths, rituals and storytelling, allowing survival across generations
in locally specific weather and climate variances.
For instance, a study on Tsonga IKS and climate change early
warning indicators and systems in Nkomazi Municipality,
Mpumalanga Province, South Africa showed that the smallholder
farmers used their local knowledge on plant phenology as climate
https://www.jef.or.jp/journal/

change indicators. Thus, when specific fruit trees such as guava
trees, miracle fruit trees (locally known as mathunduluka), marula
trees (locally known as muganu), as well as leafy vegetables such as
amaranths (locally known as imbuya and inkakha) produce highyields, a good forthcoming planting season with good rains isindicated. However, they experienced that an abundance of fruits
from trees (locally known as makwakwa Strychnos spinosa) andemantulwa (Vangueria infausta) signaled drought and food scarcity
in the coming season.
In terms of the behavior of organisms such as birds, locusts, ants,
frogs and worms they highlighted the appearance of a local sparrow(known in the IsiTsonga language as inkontjane) as indicative of rain
coming in a day, while the croaking of frogs was an indicator of
immediate rain. These findings were similar to those observed byother studies in Tanzania. Furthermore, the farmers also indicatedthat the appearance of birds locally known as tindzayana indicatedthe coming of the dry season. In Burkino Faso, herders watch the“nesting of a koobaagi”, the Fulani name for a small quail-like bird, inthe early rainy season. The herders believe that when “nests hanghigh on trees then rains will be heavy; when nests hang low rains will
be scarce”. Comparative observations were experienced in Nissa,
Malawi, where farmers indicated that the emergence of grasshoppers(dziwala) and birds known as chikhaka in Chichewa or Nyanja, wasindicative of drought.

AIKS in Traditional Medicines for Community
Primary Healthcare
The high number of use reports of African Traditional Medicine(ATM) in primary healthcare references demonstrates thesignificance of ATM knowledge and practices among the diversity of
African communities. For example, studies done among the Maasai
people in Tanzania and Kenya, predominantly pastoralists andnomads, revealed that they had over 300 medicinal plant species
with more than 2,000 use reports. The indicated use reports wereclassified into health disorder categories based on the International
Classification of Primary Care (ICPC) system. The common use of
species could be attributed to their high species diversity. Species
with high diversity are more available and visible to people, hence
are likely to be preferred for use, resulting in high numbers of use
reports. Moreover, comparative studies on the use of traditional
medicines among the Maasai reveal that the most common categoryof health conditions treated with medicinal plants was
gastrointestinal disorders. These are followed by respiratory,
muscular-system disorders and malaria.

African Indigenous Crops Contribution to Global
Food Cultural Diversity
Increasing research studies, within and outside Africa, reveal thegeneral lack of knowledge and awareness on Africa’s indigenous
crops contribution to global food cultural diversity, especially theirsocio-cultural influences on cuisines, beverages, householdproducts, and the IKS associated with their cultivation and landrace
selections. Most of these African indigenous crops are nutritious, ofhigh value and environmental and climate stress tolerant. Lack ofknowledge and awareness of the contributions of Africa’s indigenous
crops has negative practical consequences including inadequate
investments in preserving and maximizing the use of crop diversity
to increase global food and nutritional security, especially in the fightagainst the adverse effects of pandemics such as Covid-19. This is
despite the fact that these systems embed thousands of years ofaccumulated agronomic expertise in local communities. As a resultof this limited knowledge and awareness across the globe on thesignificance of crops of African origin, in the different parts of theworld, agricultural scientists and other stakeholders including policy
makers have not taken advantage of this contribution. This is crucial
since the world is now facing increasing challenges of climatechange, affecting food and nutritional insecurity.

The Case of Covid-19
When Covid-19 started spreading globally, some experts
wondered why the pandemic was seemingly slow to affect Africa
given its limited health infrastructure, poverty and problems of digital
divide. Some African countries already had experiences in managing
dreadful disease outbreaks such as Ebola. This had strengthened
their response to other pandemics including Covid-19. Throughbuilding on the AIKS, African societies have managed to reduce theimpact of Covid-19 compared to other global regions, demonstrating
the potentiality of AIKS in sustainable development processes.
Covid-19 has shown that regardless of the differences in politicalregimes of the countries, all people across cultures, social classes
and regions are vulnerable to pandemics. The pandemic exposed thefollowing aspects in the context of AIKS:(i) Western knowledge systems and technologies alone do nothave all the solutions to global challenges including
pandemics such as Covid-19;(ii) Pandemics are not just biological but have socio-economic,
environmental, cultural and political dimensions;(iii) Covid-19 has shown the necessity of complementarity andinterface of knowledge and technology systems including
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43

AIKS to mitigate global challenges;(iv) Covid-19 has shown the efficacy of AIKS and that Africa’s
past lessons from different pandemics have made Africans
resilient;(v) The holistic, multi- and trans-disciplinary and communitybased approach of AIKS to healthcare including ATMs andhealing saved millions of Africans from the Covid-19
pandemic;(vi) In most African societies, indigenous forms of knowledge on
traditional medicines and healing systems are used. These are
not only about treating the biological aspects of health, butalso involve the holistic dimensions of health embedded andarticulated in indigenous languages and philosophies. For
instance, in South Africa, there is an African indigenous
philosophy called “Ubuntu”, which promotes solidarity,
compassion, human dignity, consensus and respect, tomitigate common challenges;(vii) Limitations of current Western knowledge and technologies in
Covid-19 have emphasised the necessity of more research on
the holistic nature of ATM including the comparative role of
African indigenous languages and associated home-grownphilosophies in healthcare.
In the past, there was a neglect of understanding African
indigenous survival strategies and resilience from past healthcare
challenges embedded in indigenous languages and associated homegrown philosophies. Western education in Africa tends to depend on
external resources, often creating a digital divide among socialgroups and communities. It is therefore important to recognise therelevance of AIKS in education and sustainable livelihood.
The pandemic also emphasised the need for African countries tolearn from its global partners that have leveraged their indigenous
home-grown philosophies, languages, knowledge and innovation
systems for economic growth and sustainable development.

Building on the Indigenous:
Lessons from East Asia
In today’s economic growth and development discourse, thedevelopment trajectory of many East Asian countries is reflected as
successes due to:(i) Ability to complement their IKS, home-grown philosophiesand languages with other knowledge, innovation andtechnological systems from the global pool of knowledge todevelop their own distinctive philosophical and technologicaldevelopment perspectives;(ii) East Asian states’ capacity to create the necessary conditions
44 Japan SPOTLIGHT • May / June 2021

for socio-economic development, including investment,sustainable use and protection of natural resources, humancapital development, mobilisation, promotion and protectionof indigenous knowledge systems, grassroots innovations
and home-grown philosophies;(iii) The inclusive nature of their economic growth and generating
exceptional inclusion for all in wealth and job creation;(iv) Promotion of domestic savings and investment. There wereconcerted efforts at household, corporate and government
levels to:• invest in culturally relevant education for social capability
and mobility;• create internalised labor markets that bound firms toworkers and workers to firms, thereby giving workers astrong incentive to flexibly adapt to new technology,
improved social capability;• improve industrial policy that reduced the cost to private
firms of securing foreign technology, enhancing social
capacity.

Building on AIKS & Resources for Sustainable
Development
In the context of this discussion, building on the indigenous is notnecessarily what is traditional but whatever the African people
themselves, in their specific cultural and ecological communities,
consider to be an authentic expression of their cultural values.
Building on the indigenous as a philosophy of life creates selfreliance and instills confidence among the African people. One of the
impacts of slavery, colonisation and apartheid, was the destructionof a sense of confidence among African people in the development
process. The marginalisation of African culture and history went
hand in hand with that of its AIKS, indigenous languages and homegrown philosophies.
The Covid-19 pandemic emphasizes Africa’s need for reviving its
own scientific and technological development. This involves thefollowing:(i) Leveraging Africa’s strategic geographical location
The African continent is bounded on the west by the Atlantic
Ocean, on the north by the Mediterranean Sea, on the east by the
Red Sea and the Indian Ocean, and on the south by the Atlantic andIndian oceans. This strategic position provides opportunities for
Africa to build on its indigenous “Blue Economy” potentials as an
emerging global economic concept. The potentialities of Africa’s blue
economy involves developing its IKS-based ocean industries andsectors aligned with African indigenous marine environmental ethics
for socio-economic growth and improve livelihood opportunities. It
includes some of Africa’s key income-earning sectors, such as smallscale and commercial fisheries, as well as aquaculture, coastal
tourism, transport and ports, mining and energy. This has a great
potential for Africa to expand its inter-regional trade; for instance, in
the Indian Ocean region, inter-regional trade in 2017 accounted for
27.2%.

(ii) Human and natural resources
The history of the continent provides sufficient evidence that
Africa has the potential to restore and revive its historical legacy as
the cradle of humankind and dignity. African countries can enter into
complementary knowledge and technological partnerships with
developed countries to use its rich diverse and holistic IKS-based
capability systems (including cultural, linguistic, spiritual, scientific,
technological and moral knowledge) for sustainable development of
its minerals, flora and fauna into unique IKS products and services.
With over 60% of the world’s arable land, Africa can feed itself andbecome the bread basket of the world. Moreover, Africa hasapproximately 30% of the earth’s mineral resources (cobalt, nickel
and uranium, titanium, graphite, iron ore, phosphates, aluminum,
gas, and copper, as well as diamonds and gold) as the inputs for
production of goods in the 4th Industrial Revolution, which makes it
the world’s fastest-growing region for foreign direct investment.
Africa is the youngest continent in the world, with 60% of its
population aged below 25 who can be developed as a critical mass of
IKS-based human capital conversant on the complementarity ofknowledge systems for sustainable development and its contribution
to the global economy. However, this requires peace, security,
stability and good governance within the framework of learning fromthe past to build a better future.

(iii) Africa’s changing political landscapeOver the past two decades the socio-economic and politicallandscape on the African continent has changed dramatically. Thereis ample evidence to suggest that democracy is gradually taking rootin the continent as there are an increasing number of African leaders
who have left office democratically. This is totally different from theearlier period of life presidencies and absolute monarchies. There is
no doubt that former African heads of state and government who left
office democratically have accumulated a lot of lived experience indemocracy, leadership and governance. Their knowledge andexperiences need to be harnessed and shared across generations
and successive political leadership on the continent, especially with
the African youth. This is in line with the African indigenous

worldview and leadership ethos of learning from the past to build abetter future.
This growing realisation among African leaders for building on theindigenous and the complementarity of knowledge systems in the
global knowledge economy for building “the Africa We Want” hasbeen articulated in continental development agendas such as theAfrican Union Agenda 2063, the Lagos Plan of Action, the Final Act
of Lagos and the recently adopted African Continental Free Trade
Area (AfCFTA). The latter provides a framework for tradeliberalisation of goods and services to be implemented in all 54
African countries with an estimated combined GDP of US$2.5 trillion
for a population of over 1.2 billion, making AfCFTA the largest free
trade area in the world.

(iv) Africa’s historical legacy and heritage as sustainable
developmental assets in the global economy
Contrary to past Western thought that before colonisation African
people had no social institutions and no history of science,
innovation and technology ideas, historical and archeologicaltestimonies such as the remains of the ancient city of Gede in Kenya,
Great Zimbabwe, the Great Pyramids, Timbuktu and other historicallandmarks show Africa has the world’s oldest record of scientifictechnological achievements including great civilisations. These
historical achievements could have only been guided by highlysophisticated African indigenous socio-economic, political, spiritualand cultural institutions developed by African people’s themselves.
However, post-colonial African countries have not yet managed toleverage these IKS, including historical scientific and technologicalachievements and resources for sustainable development (Photo &Chart. Please note that the Chart is included to show cultural
diversity and not as comments on political independence
movements).

Conclusion
AIKS puts emphasis on conceptualizing cultural diversity as an
asset for complementarity and democracy of knowledge systems to
mitigate global challenges. Cultural diversities and indigenous
knowledge are not unique characteristics of African countries andexist in every country and region.
Building on the indigenous and advancing complementarity ofknowledge systems within and outside Africa, as an asset, paves theway for:(i) creating high-level multilateral platforms and strategic
partnerships that advance international humanunderstanding, mutual cooperation, social and epistemic
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45

justice;(ii) development of strategic programs and partnerships to
produce unique products and services for competitive
advantage in the global market economy through the interfaceof IKS and resources, with other knowledge and technologicalsystems;(iii) building a new generation of global human capital conversantin the significance of IKS for international peacebuilding, anda sustainable and dynamic global market economy;(iv) developing global educational programs to promoteknowledge and awareness of rich cultural diversity andhistorical contribution to the global pool of knowledge.
When diversity is seen as an asset, local IKS could be harnessed
for the benefit of humankind and to mitigate global challenges.

Historical Landmarks of Africa’s Scientific & Technological Ideas

Africa’s Cultural &Linguistics Map

African Religious
Diversity Map

African Civilizations
Pre-colonial Map

Remains ofancient
African city
Gede, Kenya

Great
Zimbabwe

Aksumite
Empire Ruins,
Ethiopia

Luxor
Temple,Egypt

Kilwa-kisiwani
MosqueTanzania

Rock Hewn
Churches of
Lalibela,
Ethiopia

South-Africa’sAdamsCalendar

Great Pyramidof Giza, Egypt

Nok Caves,
Togo

Songhai EmpireMosque, Djenne

Timbuktu,
Mali

Ancient
Tanneries in
Fez Morocco.

Landmarks of Africa as cradle of humankind

46 Japan SPOTLIGHT • May / June 2021

Photo: Author

CHART

Indigenous knowledge elsewhere
Linguistic & cultural diversity in UK
Scottish Gaelic name:
Pàrtaidh Nàiseanta na h-Alba
Scottish name:Scots Naitional Pairtie
English name: Scottish National Party (SNP)
Welsh name: Plaid Cymru
English name: The Party of Wales
Irish name: Sinn Féin
(Meaning: Ourselves)
Cornish name: Mebyon Kernow
English name: The Party for Cornwall
Cornish name: Party Kenethlegek Kernow
English name: Cornish Nationalist Party (CNP)
Manx name: Mec Vannin (Meaning: Sons of Mann)
Manx name: Liberal Vannin Party

Diverse linguistic & cultural minorities in Europe

Japan SPOTLIGHT • May / June 2021

47

Linguistic & cultural diversity (languages &dialects) in Japan

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Linguistic & cultural diversity on Korean Peninsula

Source: Komatsu Research & Advisory (KRA)

Prof. Hassan Omari Kaya is principal researcher and director of the DSI(Department of Science & Innovation)-NRF (National Research Foundation)
Centre of Excellence in Indigenous Knowledge Systems, University of KwaZuluNatal, South Africa.

48 Japan SPOTLIGHT • May / June 2021