IN AN ANCIENT AND MYSTERIOUS VALLEY, A STRUGGLE FOR THE FUTURE OF AFRICA In Ethiopia’s remote Lower Omo Valley, where our human ancestors first crafted tools, Africa’s most famous Indigenous peoples practice timeless rituals rooted in land and cattle, lives shaped by the sun, rain, and cosmos.
Their world is shaken when Ethiopia’s development revolutionaries spot treasure in waters of the fabled Omo River tumbling from the highlands. The Omo will nourish the greatest agricultural dream in Ethiopia’s history, while pushing these ancient cultures to the brink.
In this captivating insider’s memoir of the drama that shaped America’s global development policy on Indigenous rights, meet the wily officials, fiery activists, storied anthropologists, human zoo tourists, and embattled conservationists caught up in the struggle. In this valley beyond all valleys, does the past have a future?
Author Edward DeMarco, an award-winning former democracy and governance strategist for the United States Agency for International Development - and, earlier, an international politics editor in Washington - takes you on a fascinating journey to the heart of this eye-opening story.
For readers who love stories of Africa, international development, exotic cultures and landscapes and the social and economic choices we confront in the globalizing 21st century, LAST DAYS IN NAKED VALLEY is rich in insights wrapped in an engaging, character-driven narrative. Beyond famous Ethiopia coffee, Ethiopian food and your Ethiopian flight, here is a mesmerizing, untold tale from this legendary land.
Why is a mysterious valley in Ethiopia of world importance to human rights and global development and investment?
In the Omo Valley as in other lands of native peoples around the world, the urgency of balancing economic development and cultural survival is growing. As the United Nations notes in The State of the World’s Indigenous Peoples, much of the planet’s remaining minerals, fossil fuels and forests - along with choice farmland - is found on traditional lands. Also at stake: thousands of years of Indigenous knowledge about managing natural resources and coping with climate change.
While so much attention has focused on the disputed Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) on the Nile River in northern Ethiopia, the dramatic global development events in the Omo Valley have unfolded almost unnoticed. LAST DAYS IN NAKED VALLEY illuminates this foundational struggle for the future of Africa and its impact on foreign aid, sustainable investment, and the survival of ancient peoples everywhere.
Richly describing Ethiopia’s incredible landscapes and the extraordinary people who live there, LAST DAYS IN NAKED VALLEY will change the way you see the past - and the future.
