Changes in Resource Use and Subsistence Activities Under the Plantation Expansion in Sarawak, Malaysia

Abstract

This chapter considers the effect of plantation development on human resource use and subsistence activities in Sarawak, Malaysia. With the demand for palm oil, natural forest has rapidly changed into plantations in tropical areas in recent decades. While the large-scale plantations expand dramatically, it is unclear how their resource use and subsistence activities change after plantations spread. This chapter examines the alteration of subsistence activities, including, shifting cultivation, hunting, gathering wild plants, and cash crop cultivation.

I found that shifting cultivation has not much changed in terms of work processes, cultivation areas, and crops. However, an increasing number of families have recently cultivated their paddy fields along roads. As for hunting, before plantation expansion the local population hunted various animals in the natural forest, but after it they mostly chase wild boar in the plantations at night. They used diverse wild plants of the natural forest before plantations spread, but these wild plants have sharply decreased around plantations. After the expansion of road networks and oil palm plantations, people now have new opportunities to cultivate oil palms as smallholders. This chapter illustrates how people try to continue the conventional way of livelihood even under the plantation expansion. They also adapt flexibly to the new environment by using resources available around the plantations.