Sama Bajo Resilience in the Time of COVID

Abstract

ABSTRACTSama Bajo fishing communities in Southeast Sulawesi maintain a strong cultural and economic orientation to diverse fishing‐based livelihoods and varied engagement with high value seafood market supply chains. The onset of the COVID‐19 pandemic within Indonesia in early 2020, and its viral spread across the archipelago over 2021, had dramatic and disruptive impacts on local economies and distribution networks that sustain livelihoods, market services and the distribution of food supplies. Despite these dislocations and the continuing threat of COVID infections for mostly unvaccinated regional populations, the following study of Sama Bajo communities highlights their remarkable resilience in the face of pressing vulnerabilities. The capacity to develop and implement a range of adaptive strategies reflects a long‐term accommodation to dynamic seasonal fluctuations, and the enduring value of diverse marine‐based livelihood options. In this paper we highlight some of the systemic impacts of the COVID pandemic and a variety of ways that Sama Bajo households have found to cope and even thrive under difficult conditions.