African Affairs Advance Access originally published online on February 21, 2006
African Affairs 2006 105(419):219-241; doi:10.1093/afraf/adi105
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What harm? Kenyan and Ugandan perspectives on khat
Susan Beckerleg is based in the UK and is affiliated to the University of Warwick and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
What harm does khat actually do to users and the communities in which they live? In this article, the health-related, social, economic, and religious arguments of Kenyans and Ugandans for and against khat consumption are reported. The medical evidence for harm from khat is far from compelling, and the East African debate on khat is informed by local political discourses that often are closely connected to issues of ethnicity and the control of resources. As a result, the harm attributed to khat consumption is contested. The objective of most local efforts to curb the use of khat in East African towns is the reduction of social and economic ills. Yet, eliminating khat consumption would not reverse the problems that it is identified as causing.
1. United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.
2. See, for example, Roy Porter and Mikulas Teich, Drugs and Narcotics in History (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1995); John Goodman, Paul E. Lovejoy, and Andrew Sheratt, Consuming Habits: Drugs in history and anthropology (Routledge, London and New York, 1995).
3. Daniel M. Varisco, ‘The elixir of life or the devil’s cud? The debate over qat (Catha edulis) in Yemeni culture’, in Ross Coomber and Nigel South (eds), Drug Use and Cultural Contexts: ‘Beyond the west’ (Free Association Books, London, 2004), pp. 101–118.
4. Ezekiel Gebissa, Leaf of Allah: Khat and agricultural transformation in Harerge, Ethiopia 1875–1991 (James Currey, Oxford, 2004).
5. UNODCCP, The Drug Nexus in Africa (UN Office for Drug Control & Crime Prevention Monographs, Vienna, 1999); H.M. Adam and R. Ford (eds), Mending the Rips in the Sky: Options for Somali communities in the 21st century (Red Sea Press, Lawrenceville and Asmara, 1997).
6. Neil Carrier, ‘Miraa is cool: the cultural importance of miraa (khat) for Tigania and Igembe youth in Kenya’, Journal of African Cultural Studies, forthcoming.
7. ESRC Award (RES-143-25-0046): ‘The Khat Nexus: trans-national consumption in a global economy’.
8. The British colonial authorities attempted to ban khat in Kenya between 1945 and 1956 but found regulation unworkable.
9. Paul Goldsmith, Symbiosis and Transformation in Kenya’s Meru District (University of Florida, unpublished PhD thesis, 1994).
10. Neil Carrier, The Social Life of Miraa: Farming, trade and consumption of a plant stimulant in Kenya (University of St Andrews, unpublished PhD thesis, 2003).
11. M. Ahmed and M. Garret, Proceedings of a Seminar on Khat and Health (Tower Hamlets Health Strategy Group, London, 1994); H.A. Utteh, ‘The plight of Somali refugees in Europe, with particular reference to Germany (1993)’, in Adam and Ford, Mending Rips, pp. 449–59.
12. Mark Horton and John Middleton, The Swahili: The social landscape of a mercantile society (Blackwell Publishers, Oxford, 2000).
13. Interview with Imam Mahmoud Abdulkadr of Lamu.
14. Goldsmith, Symbiosis and Transformation.
15. Interview with Imam Mahmoud Abdulkadr.
16. Thanks to Imam Mahmoud Abdulkadr and committee members for providing copies of campaign correspondence. Photocopies of correspondence in the possession of the author.
17. Undated leaflet, issued by Nairobi office of UNODC, is entitled KHAT: (Catha edulis).
18. UNODC, KHAT: (Catha edulis).
19. See, for example, John Kennedy, The Flower of Paradise: The institutionalized use of the drug qat in North Yemen (Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht, 1987).
20. M. Dhadphale and O.E. Omolo, ‘Psychiatric morbidity among khat chewers’, East African Medical Journal 65, 6 (1988), pp. 355–9.
21. M. Kithure, ‘Price of miraa. Your brain or the twig’. The Daily Nation, Nairobi, 17 May 2001.
22. Goldsmith, Symbiosis and Transformation; Carrier, The Social Life of Miraa.
23. W.J. Eggling, The Indigenous Trees of the Uganda Protectorate (The Government of the Uganda Protectorate, London, 1951), p. 79.
25. New Vision published articles on khat on 20 January 1994, 25 May 1994, 26 May 1994, and 19 December 1994. Reviewed by Saidi Famau.
27. A.O. Ihunwo, F.I.B. Kayanja, and U.B. Amadi-Ihunwo, ‘Use and perception of the psychostimulant, khat (Catha edulis) among three occupational groups in south western Uganda’, East African Medical Journal 81, 9 (2004), pp. 468–73.
28. The interviewers, Musa Almass and Mzee Hasan, were trained by Susan Beckerleg. The results were analysed using SPSS12.
29. There is little research on the effects of khat on libido, potency, and fertility. However, Hakim found a weak association between khat use and abnormal seminal fluid analysis profiles. See. L.Y. Hakim, ‘Influence of khat on seminal fluid among presumed infertile couples’, East African Medical Journal 79, 1 (2002), pp. 22–28.
30. Kennedy, The Flower of Paradise.
31. See Gebissa for an account of the spread of Ethiopia khat linked to the introduction of modern transportation in the Horn of Africa. See also Carrier, ‘The need for speed’, Africa, forthcoming.
32. Kennedy, The Flower of Paradise, p. 237.
33. Varisco, ‘The elixir of life’, p. 108.
34. Kennedy, The Flower of Paradise, p. 194.
35. Kennedy, The Flower of Paradise.
36. See Goldsmith, Symbiosis and Transformation; Carrier, The Social Life of Miraa.
37. Kennedy, The Flower of Paradise, p. 193.
38. Gebissa, Leaf of Allah, p. 18.
39. Varisco, ‘The elixir of life’, p. 104.
40. Kennedy, The Flower of Paradise, p. 232.
41. Kennedy, The Flower of Paradise.
42. Varisco, ‘The elixir of life’, pp. 111–12.
43. Kennedy, The Flower of Paradise, p. 108.
44. Gebissa, Leaf of Allah, p. 3.
45. A. Almeddom and S. Abraham, ‘Women, moral virtue and Tchat-chewing’, in M. MacDonald (ed.), Gender, Drink and Drugs. (Berg, Oxford, 1994), pp. 249–58.
46. Gebissa, Leaf of Allah, p. 11.
47. Almeddom and Abraham. ‘Women, moral virtue and Tchat-chewing’, pp. 249–50.
48. Ihunwo, et al., ‘Use and perception of the psychostimulant, khat’, p. 472.