Indigenous World 2020: Mali

By the end of 2019, Mali’s population stood at more than 20 million inhabitants1 (four times more than 59 years previously). The Tuareg (Tamazight speakers), the Moors (Arabic speakers) and, in riverine areas, the Songhay and Peuls (Fulani) are the main communities that inhabit the vast northern space that accounts for two-thirds of Mali. Their political alliances and their conflicts have shaped the history of a region in which there has been an interdependence between nomadic and settled populations, who have participated in vast economic, cultural and social exchange networks across the Sahara.