Food Security in COVID ‐19: Insights from Indigenous Fijian Communities

The global pandemic has adversely affected tourism globally, particularly in small island states heavily dependent on tourism. The closure of borders to regular flights for over a year in places such as Fiji, Samoa, Cook Islands and Vanuatu, where this research was undertaken, has resulted in massive job losses. Many tourism employees have left the once‐bustling tourist hubs, returning to villages and family settlements. Such clear urban to rural migration behaviours do not dominate movement patterns in the Pacific, but are an important and enduring strategy when shocks strike. In the case of the pandemic‐induced migration to villages, former tourism workers have had to engage in a complicated process of adapting to the communal setting, employing new – as well as traditional – strategies to sustain a livelihood. Thus, this paper will discuss how the pandemic has influenced return migration patterns in the Pacific, and the implications of this shift. Findings suggest that, despite their financial struggles, people have adapted to life in their ancestral homes by rekindling their relationships with kin and increasing their engagement on their customary land. They have relearned about traditional Indigenous knowledge, diversified their skills and reconnected with their social and ecological systems. This spiritual homecoming observed in the Pacific ultimately shows that there can be silver linings to the dark clouds of the current disorder.

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 92%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 67%

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Silver linings around dark clouds: Tourism, Covid‐19 and a return to traditional values, villages and the vanua

Movono

Scheyvens

Auckram

2022

“…The emphasis on preserving access to customary land in Vanuatu's National Sustainable Development Plan reflects scholarly research on the role of customary land in supporting the well‐being of indigenous households and communities. One important theme has been resilience – a decade ago, the global financial crisis had negligible effects on households deeply engaged in livelihoods based on customary land (Regenvanu, 2010); today in the COVID‐19 pandemic, customary land helps achieve food security goals and provides a safety net (Leweniqila and Vunibola, 2020). It is not just the land, but also the customary economic practices, that together provide resilience and ‘mutual insurance’ (McDonald et al ., 2014: 112).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Locating the traditional economy in Port Vila, Vanuatu: Disaster relief and agrobiodiversity

Drake

Liunakwalau

2022

Alternative economic indicators are becoming policy in Vanuatu, particularly focusing on what national policy calls traditional economy. Although this acknowledges livelihoods and customary land in rural areas, urban places receive less attention. This article advances an argument that cities are also home to traditional economies. We draw on concepts of diverse economies and translocality to examine how economic practices typically associated with community activities on customary land are also found in cities where households lack direct access to customary resources. Empirical data come from the authors' fieldwork and participation in community‐based organisations in Port Vila, Vanuatu, from 2017 to 2020. The case study presents surveys of agrobiodiversity in 27 urban backyards and livelihood practices of 24 households; and accounts of co‐authors' participation in community‐based disaster to distribute disaster relief supplies from urban to rural, create urban markets for rural crops and build urban resilience following Ambae Island's Manaro volcano eruptions and COVID‐19‐related unemployment. This study demonstrates how traditional economies are part of everyday urban life.

“…While it is essential to recognise the impacts that cultural connections around customary land have on economic development in the Pacific, it is also essential to look at the positive contributions land has made towards sustaining Indigenous livelihoods. Being connected to land provides a source of social security and belonging, a supermarket for food, necessities and a pharmacy of herbs (Leweniqila and Vunibola, 2020; Vunibola and Leweniqila, 2021). The strong attachment that Fijians and Papua New Guineans have to land is revealed by some of the highest levels of customary land ownership globally (Fiji 88% and PNG 97%) (Anderson, 2006; Paterson and Farran, 2013).…”

Section: Rethinking Surplus Within Diverse Economies and Indigenous E...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Indigenous enterprise on customary lands: Diverse economies of surplus

Vunibola

Steven

Scobie

2022

Self Cite

This study examines Indigenous Fijian and Papua New Guinean enterprises on customary land. It explores the duality of merging Indigenous and Western principles of entrepreneurship and the ability to balance business and socio‐cultural imperatives. A qualitative, ethnographic‐case study approach is deployed, with talanoa/tok stori used to collect empirical materials. Two interrelated themes emerged from the study: The need for Indigenous enterprise models to contribute to a more holistic conception of well‐being, and as a result, the requirement to rethink how surplus is distributed beyond mainstream shareholder ownership models. This study reveals a more nuanced approach to distributing surplus based on Indigenous conceptions of kinship. The specific theoretical contribution of this study is an Indigenous conception of surplus distribution that offers a challenge to traditional shareholder models.