Pepper in a time of crisis: Smallholder buffering strategies in Sarawak, Malaysia and West Kalimantan, Indonesia

A past study in Sarawak, Malaysia (Cramb, R.A., 1993. Shifting cultivation and sustainable agriculture in East Malaysia: a longitudinal case study. Agricultural Systems 42, 209-226) found among smallholder farmers a mutual buffer effect between price fluctuations in cash crops (black pepper, Piper nigrum L. and pararubber, Hevea brasiliensis M.-Arg.) and swidden or shifting cultivation of hill rice. The recent rise in international prices for black pepper provides an opportunity to test the generality of Cramb's original findings. For about three years beginning in 1997 and concomitant with the Asian economic crisis, smallholders throughout Southeast Asia responded to the price rises by investing more labour into existing pepper gardens, as well as planting new gardens. Here, we compare the response of Iban pepper smallholders to this situation on either side of the international border separating Sarawak, Malaysia and West Kalimantan, Indonesia, with special attention to Cramb's findings. The mutual buffering capacity of hill rice cultivation and pepper/rubber farming described by Cramb is less evident in the study communities. The primary reasons that may account for the lack of fit revolve around the extent of pepper cultivation, availability of credit or subsidy, competition with labour in hill swiddens, and presence of nearby alternatives to earn cash.