As a friend to the children commend me the Yak. You will find it exactly the thing: It will carry and fetch, you can ride on its back, Or lead it about with a string.
The Tartar who dwells on the plains of Thibet (A desolate region of snow) Has for centuries made it a nursery pet, And surely the Tartar should know!
Then tell your papa where the Yak can be got, And if he is awfully rich He will buy you the creature — or else he will not. (I cannot be positive which.)
The Yak, by Hilaire Belloc
The yak has a long documented history stretching into ancient times. As the people who kept them migrated, they took their yak with them into wider territory. It is important to stress how closely involved the yak has been, and is, with the culture, religion and social life of the pastoral people of the cold, high-mountainous regions of Asia - at least among those people who can trace their history of yak keeping back over the centuries.
[It] takes its place alongside other animals, both real and mythical, in the history, legends and mythology of the Tibetan region and neighbouring territories... Religion, ceremony, social customs and attitudes to wealth and its symbols are all intertwined with each other in the life of the people and with the integral role of the yak in all aspects of that life.
[Certainly] the yak (Bos grunniens) must be regarded as one of the world's most remarkable domestic animals as it thrives in conditions of extreme harshness and deprivation while providing a livelihood for people. A herbivore, the yak lives predominantly on the "roof of the world," [a land recognized for some of] the best grazing lands in all of Asia.
Wiener et al. (2003)
The Tibetan Plateau covers one-quarter of China's land area. It is the highest, most extensive mountain region in the world and comprises the headwaters of Asia's major rivers (the Yellow, Yangtze, Mekong, Salween and Brahmaputra rivers). The Tibetan Plateau is therefore known as the ‘water tower of Asia’ as well as ‘the third pole’ of the world ... with extensive and remote grassland, wetland and mountain landscapes... home not only to Tibetan pastoralists and their livestock, but also to a wide array of rare and endangered mammals including the Tibetan wild yak...
Foggin (2012)
[Yak live in areas that] are, to a large extent, above the tree line where there is virtually no cropping. There is no frost-free period during any part of the year. At its high elevation, the territory overall is characterized by a harsh climate of cool moist summers, severely cold winters and grazing resources restricted by very short growing seasons.
Yaks are one of the most important domestic animals in most of the pastoral area on the Tibetan plateau. Nomads place so much value on the yak that many refer to them as 'nor', which also means 'precious gem' or, more generally, 'wealth'. The yak, in many ways, defines nomadic pastoralism across most of-the plateau. Yaks provide milk and milk products, meat, hair, wool and hides. They are also used as draught animals and for riding. Yak dung is an important source of fuel in an area where firewood is not available. The yak makes life possible for people in one of the world's harshest environments. There is little doubt that the presence of wild yaks, and their later domestication, was the single most important factor in the adaptation of civilization on the Tibetan plateau.
Miller (1998)
The traditional livelihood has been nomadic pastoralism, with seasonal movements between known pastures, and with societal structures (e.g. tribal and clan arrangements) that allowed for landscape-level natural resource management decisions.
Management flexibility and other risk-averse responses, for example in the face of natural disasters, also developed within the pastoral system of resource use.
Tibetan nomads have lived in their black yak hair tents for as long as anyone can remember. Depending on the area they live in and the condition of the pasture, they move with their animals every few weeks or months in the summer and build a more permanent camp in the winter, which in most areas has now been replaced by houses.
A Tibetan nomad tent is a not comfortable dwelling.... The Tibetan [tent] is a drafty, smoky affair with a grass floor and a drippy ceiling that doesn’t hold off the rain. [But] it may have had a certain charm in the old days when the large families ... would huddle around the hearth to hear stories at night, the walls of the tent lined with skin sacks full of food and supplies and [the ground] graced with ornate teapots and brass pans.
The Tibetan Tent
People living on the Tibetan Plateau rely for survival upon the yak, the region’s native cattle... Yaks give daily sustenance in the form of milk, butter and cheese, yoghurt and whey, and occasionally meat and blood and fat.
Rhode et al. (2007)
[Weaving] yak hair is a tradition of its own, and was primarily used for making the nomad’s characteristic dark brown tents, ropes, monastery awnings and door curtains. [Yak hair] is hand woven in narrow strips from a back strap loom, into a very dense, heavy, rough and long lasting fabric.
Norden
Yaks were also used as load animals to transport goods from one end of the plateau to the other, travelling in large caravans and as mounts, especially during the long journeys people undertook when trading or going on pilgrimage.
Norlha
More prosaically, yak dung serves nearly all heating and cooking needs in a land where people require ample fuel but where wood or coal are scarce or nonexistent. Traditional Tibetan pastoral economy is fueled mainly by dung of yak, sheep, and goat (Goldstein and Beall, 1990). Each year, the yak produces three to four times its own weight in dung, a load that goes into cooking and heating, plaster and manure, construction of fences, walls, shrines, and storage rooms and is sometimes traded or sold to obtain other needed commodities.
In competition [yak may] jump and give a backward kick. And some are startled because of the loud cheers from the spectators to turn round and return back, which makes the race all the more wonderful, exciting, and enjoyable.
Cultural China
For millennia, Tibetan nomads and their livestock have dealt with snowstorms and severe winters in the highly dynamic ecosystem that exists on the Tibetan plateau. Pastoralism in these conditions has always been a high-risk enterprise. Nomads learned to cope with the uncertainties of the environment by adopting a number of flexible production strategies that minimized risk and made optimal use of the resources available to them.
A variety of government policies have been applied in recent years to protect the ecology and biodiversity of China's grasslands. There is growing concern, though, that national and global economic considerations have overshadowed emerging conservation agendas. Additionally, the social dimensions of these policies deserve more attention than they have received to date...
[Recent development programmes may also] inadvertently [lead to] rapid transition from a rural 'nomadic' lifestyle toward increased sedentarization of a people. This has led to a decrease in seasonal mobility and flexibility within livestock management practices, both of which have been essential components of Tibetan nomadic pastoralism for centuries.
Most grassland systems have in fact evolved over time as grazed ecosystems...
Foggin (2008)
A government policy aimed to alleviate poverty in rural Qinghai was begun in the mid- to late-1990s called the “Four-Way Scheme.” The 'four ways' were to subsidize the building of houses for herders (to use instead of tents), subsidize shelters for livestock (to improve the over-winter survival of livestock), erect fences (to improve efficiency and to 'rationalize' animal husbandry), and grow additional fodder (also to enhance over-winter survival of livestock)...
[However] in many instances the socio-cultural impact has been dramatic... demanding much of local people including... loss of livelihoods and breakdown of community ties.
Globalization is a worldwide increase in interconnectivity and interdependence socially, culturally, environmentally, economically, and politically. It has introduced a shrinking of virtual space... A major component or accelerating factor caused by globalization is the movement of the world's population towards cities. However, many indigenous peoples or ethnic minorities within a geopolitical nation-state often have little say in choosing the terms on which they wish to engage with the 'outside world.'
For thousands of years they survived by raising animals. However, Tibetan nomads didn’t merely eke out a living; they created a unique nomadic culture and contributed to, and were a part of, a remarkable civilization that was the most powerful empire in Asia over 1,300 years ago.
Miller (2007)
Historically, the local people were organized largely along tribal and clan lineages with collaborative management of resources and traditional community support mechanisms... [Today] there still remains (or remained until recently) in most herding communities a strong sense of community identity that goes well beyond village level elections and recalls past tribal and clan affiliations...
[Now] a more synchronized integration of the environment, economy, society and culture is suggested as a proper basis for ‘sustainability’ in the region.
Foggin & Torrance-Foggin (2017)
Bos grunniens Linnaeus, 1766, and Bos mutus (Przewalski, 1883) are the domestic and wild forms, respectively, of the bovid commonly called the yak. [Wild yak] inhabits remote high-elevation alpine meadows and alpine steppe in rolling to mountainous terrain in the Tibetan Plateau [whereas the domestic yak] is maintained widely in China and other parts of Central Asia, and uncommonly elsewhere in the world... Although no complete survey of [wild yak] has been conducted, there are probably no more than 15,000 remaining in remote areas of the Tibetan Plateau; [the domestic yak] numbers about 14 million.
Leslie and Schaller (2009)
To cite: Foggin, J. M. 2020. The Yak. Bishkek, Kyrgyz Republic: Plateau Perspectives. https://stories.plateauperspectives.org/the-yak
All photographs © Foggin 2020, unless noted otherwise
The author and his family have lived and worked for many years in the Tibetan plateau region. Through this experience, they have in their own personal lives also come to greatly value the yak!
To read more about their experiences, read this photo story.
The yak (Bos grunniens) must be regarded as one of the world's most remarkable domestic animals as it thrives in conditions of extreme harshness and deprivation while providing a livelihood for people. A herbivore, the yak lives predominantly on the "roof of the world", as the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau is often called. The Plateau itself extends over 2.5 million sq km (about 1 million square miles) and was described by Miller (1990) as the most extensive high-elevation region on earth and the best grazing lands in all of Asia.
The yak is critical for the life and economic activity of the people on the vast and inhospitable Qinghai-Tibetan plateau and on the surrounding mountainous areas. This article gives an overview of the domestication, the geographical distribution, the herding practices, the production and the products of the yak. Its breeding and hybridization management, as well as its reproduction and its special adaptation attributes are reviewed. Concluding thoughts about the role of the research and the role of social changes - driven from within or imposed from above - on the future of yak production systems are outlined.
Bos grunniens Linnaeus, 1766, and Bos mutus (Przewalski, 1883) are the domestic and wild forms, respectively, of the bovid commonly called the yak. B. mutus inhabits remote high-elevation alpine meadows and alpine steppe in rolling to mountainous terrain in the Tibetan Plateau, and B. grunniens is maintained widely in China and other parts of Central Asia, and uncommonly elsewhere in the world. Populations of B. mutus are substantially reduced and fragmented throughout its remaining range; the largest numbers occur in northern Tibet and western Qinghai. B. mutus is vulnerable because of poaching and competition with domestic livestock. Although no complete survey of B. mutus has been conducted, there are probably no more than 15,000 remaining in remote areas of the Tibetan Plateau; B. grunniens numbers about 14 million.
In the vast high altitude rangelands of the Tibetan plateau, and of the surrounding mountain regions of Central Asia, yak husbandry has for millennia contributed to the sustenance and cultures of people living in these challenging, often marginal lands. Today, of the world’s estimated 14 million domestic yak, around 90% are found in China... First domesticated around 10,000 years ago, yak provide fundamentals necessary for both traditional and modern lifestyles, from meat and milk products, to fiber, yak dung, and transportation...
Herders of Forty Centuries: People have made use of the Tibetan Plateau and Himalaya for thousands of years. The movement of early hunters, herders, farmers, traders, troops and pilgrims across Central Asia and Tibet laid the foundation for a nomadic way of life that continues today. Knowing a little of this history helps appreciation of the legacy that nomads have inherited. The first people to use the grazing lands were hunters. Archaeological excavations near Qinghai Lake on the northeastern margin of the Tibetan Plateau have found stone tools from hunters’ camps that have been dated to 15,000 years ago. Rock art of a similar age, depicting wild animals and hunting scenes are also encountered at many sites in Western Tibet.
The cultural traditions of a highland culture come alive in this survey of a society of nomadic pastoralists, the aBrog Pa people, where ecology dominates their existence and prescribes their manner of living. "Fields on the Hoof" is a study of the complex interdependency of many factors: the influence of the high-altitude environment and its resources; the influence of Buddhism as it counters the survival of folk belief; the social system, culture, and personality the aBrog Pa share with other pastoral nomads; and the adaptation of man to animal and animal to man.
Yak is specially adapted to high-altitude environments and is a flagship species for the Hindu Kush Himalayan (HKH) region. It plays a key role not only in agrobiodiversity conservation and maintaining high-altitude rangeland ecosystems, but also in cultural traditions, livelihood strategies, and all aspects of socioeconomic development in high mountain areas of the region. But yak are coming under increasing pressure with closed borders and restrictions on grazing and movement, and yak herders are facing immense livelihood challenges...
Yak (Bos grunniens L.) herding plays an important role in the domestic economy throughout much of the Asian highlands. Yak represents a major mammal species of the rangelands found across the Asian highlands from Russia and Kyrgyzstan in the west to the Hengduan Mountains of China in the east. Yak also has great cultural significance to the people of the Asian highlands and is closely interlinked to the traditions, cultures, and rituals of the herding communities. However, increasing issues like poverty, environmental degradation, and climate change have changed the traditional practices of pastoralism, isolating and fragmenting herders and the pastures they have been using for many years.
Tibetan grasslands constitute one of the most important grazing ecosystems in the world. Distributed widely across the high plains and mountains of the Tibetan plateau, these grasslands encompass the source areas of many major Asian rivers. Around 40 percent of the world's population depends on, or is influenced by, these rivers. However there is growing concern that economic considerations have overshadowed emerging conservation agendas and the social dimensions of development policies deserve more attention than they have received to date. This article critically reviews several key policies affecting pastoralists, focusing on the Sanjiangyuan region.
Black tents serve as mobile housing for a majority of the nomadic groups in a belt that stretches from the shores of the Atlantic Ocean to the eastern Tibetan Plateau. The existence of the black tent in its easternmost distribution has rarely been discussed in detail. In most regions, the requirements of the tent are determined by hot, arid climatic conditions, whereas an arid high mountain climate predominates on the Tibetan Ptateau. The eastern part receives precipitation of over 500 mm annually. This raises questions about how Tibetan nomads have adapted the black tent to their specific needs and to environmental conditions. Using examples from a region in the eastern Tibetan Plateau, these questions are examined through descriptions of tent variations, construction, interior, choice of location for pitching the tent, and the strategies of tent dwellers to improve protection from cold and rain.
Extensive pastoral production covers some 25 percent of the world's land area and produces 10 percent of the meat used for human consumption, while supporting some 20 million pastoral households. Pastoral production is split between the extensive enclosed systems that are typical of North America, Australia and parts of South America, and the open access systems of Africa, the Andes, Asia and Siberia, which are still largely the province of "traditional" producers.
The Kegawa Herders Cooperative was established by herders in the Yushu area to produce and sell livestock products, to help provide employment, and to generate income for community members in ecologically sound ways. It seeks to fill the notable gap between state level programs and individual (household) management of grassland resources – returning to more community-oriented governance mechanisms, yet still building on each individual's commitment and personal benefits. Every member of the cooperative is both an investor and shareholder.
kora has teamed up with the Kegawa Herders’ Cooperative, a collective of ~90 families in the Yushu Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture. The families live at, or above, 4500m altitude year round. We buy their wool at a set mid-market rate throughout the buying season in order to offer them price certainty, and in addition we pay a stipend of 10%. To access wool from areas beyond our reach, we use a network of local agents on the plateau. But our goal is to buy all our wool directly from herder cooperatives. As wool needs grow, we look to find new Tibetan nomad families and new cooperatives with whom to partner.
Our Mission Statement and Code of Ethics can be broken down into three words: to Preserve, Promote, and Protect our North American Yak Herd. IYAK and NAYR work together to support these commitments and objectives.
“The waters from Sanjiangyuan sustain life for 600 million people downstream but in recent years this vast water tower is under threat..." Now, the government’s resettlement programmes are seeking to modernize society and halt environmental degradation, but look set to break the heart of the unique Tibetan nomadic culture, bringing inner city problems to a rural world...
For centuries, Dokpa migration routes spanned the rugged frontier between Tibet and the Kingdom of Sikkim. Their transnational existence persisted until the early 1960’s, by which time Tibet had fallen under the control of China and Sikkim had entered into a special relationship with India, retaining its independence (until 1975) but relying on India’s army for its defense. Many Dokpas - who are also known as Doksas or Drokpas - liked to spend summers in North Sikkim, where the alpine valleys provided rich grass for their herds...
No day on our Mount Everest Base Camp Adventure would have been complete without having to spend at least 2-3 times dodging the infamous Yak trains that ply the trails through the Himalayas.
© 2026 Plateau Perspectives
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