The Bassari farming community living in Salemata in the Kedougou region of southeastern Senegal

Knowledge systems

        Bassari society has a well-organized community organization where each person belongs to an age group so that with respect for his elder, everyone respects the established order and participates in the evolution of the society that ensures its existence. Everything, or almost everything, is done in a group. The individual is surrounded, from birth to death, by the extended family. It is therefore the group that gives the Bassari its confidence, its gaiety, its solidarity, its hospitality ... The bassari system of the social organization is still relevant. It is, indeed, thanks to this system that wherever they live and work, the Bassaris stand out and appreciate by their discipline, their seriousness, the respect of others and their goods, etc. In Senegal, some personalities like Moustapha Mamba GUIRASSY, former minister of state, in charge of communication and spokesman of the government, think that the bassari societal model deserves to be known by others who should be inspired in the public as in the private. However, whatever the relevance of this social organization, there are some disadvantages. The Bassaris are also known for their shyness. This lack of audacity, especially characterizes the Bassaris of the diaspora. It is a sort of inferiority complex that manifests itself in the fear of committing and taking initiatives within modern society with multiple and varied dimensions whose operating system they seem to ignore.

                                            Agro-ecological approches

        The main activity of the Bassaris is agriculture, it occupies them intensively during the winter, while hunting and crafts are dry season occupations. To fertilize their soil, they use squares around their huts, within a radius of about fifty meters, the soil is improved by the inputs of household detritus, ashes, goat's poop that are spread. The first year of habitation in a square, this soil is not cultivated because too poor in organic matter; the cows are tied that year around the huts during the wintering period and participate in their excrement to improve the soil. This improved soil, owes its wealth to the proximity of the huts and is grown only during the period of habitation. It is mostly corn and some accessory crops: okra, tobacco, taro and yams. The main crops, millet, peanut, ground peas and fonio, are grown on schistose arenas or on lateritic chippings. Crops are alternated because these shallow soils are poor in organic matter.

                                              Interventions and approaches 

        My research focuses on the study and valorization of edible mushrooms of the Niokolo Koba National Park (Eastern Senegal), highlighting mushrooms consumed by Bassaris. My interventions will have an ethnomycological approach, surveys will be carried out in the targeted areas. First with Bassaris because they are closer to the Park. Then the other ethnic groups will be targeted. We will try to interview a dozen people per village based on a very specific questionnaire by following several criteria (age, gender, ethnicity etc. ...). This is to check the state of knowledge and the use of mushrooms by local people. Rural populations will be targeted. These are in direct contact with wild natural products such as mushrooms. Ethnomycological surveys will be carried out with the help of a collection of photos obtained during the mushroom samples inventory. In order to collect reliable and credible information, it is always desirable to repeat surveys of the populations and this by triangulation. The interviews will be resumed during this phase and will be based on fresh specimens of mushrooms. Data on edibility, toxicity, food and medicinal use will be recorded during this phase. The data will be collected on survey cards made on the basis of a specific questionnaire. Information not included on the questionnaire and from the populations will also be noted.