Quelle « place » pour des pêcheurs urbains ? Le cas de Bamako (Mali)

Abstract

In the 1990s, fishing in Mali attracted a lot of research in regard to the inner delta region, but little has been studied in the Upper Niger and even less in the capital city. Yet the part of the Niger river crossing Bamako is a place of still unappreciated intensive fishing with its own territorial, technical and governance specificities. No less than 21 fishermen camps are located on the banks and islands in the capital that contribute to the urban economy. But the spatial and demographic growth of Bamako generates numerous constraints on the fishermen community, among which the access to land property. Thus, an ambitious plan for the beautification of the river banks is threatening this activity. The occupation and the future of the fishermen of Bamako deserve to be more thoroughly studied because of the instructive dynamics and innovations observed for both the analysis and the change of this activity within the national economy, as well as for the differing imagined “urbanities” that they highlight.

Keywords

• urbanity
• Bamako
• Niger river
• urban fishing
• water territory
• urban environment