Lamalera, subsistence whaling, and barter

J.B. Blikololong, The Jakarta Post 18 Apr 09;

The declaration of the Savu Sea as a national conservation area on the sidelines of the World Ocean Conference in Manado next month has sent the traditional whale hunting community of Lamalera in Lembata, East Nusa Tenggara, into great anxiety, as the plan was thought to imply a prohibition on whaling.

The community reportedly protested the presence of any NGOs presumed to be behind the issue of the whaling ban.

"The prohibition on whaling will lead to the death of the community," says Apol Korohama, head of Lika Telo Adat institution.

Earlier, East Nusa Tenggara Governor Frans Lebu Raya said the conservation of the Savu Sea should not wipe out the whale hunting tradition conducted for hundreds of years and fully laden with values of brotherhood and justice.

Lamalera, a fishing community with a population of 1,688 (comprising 483 families, 279 of them classified as poor), has extreme geographical conditions (with no productive farmland), forcing its people to depend wholly on marine resources. Sperm whales, the favorite catch among other big sea mammals, was their main catch.

Outsiders are mostly attracted by the traditional whaling, whereas it is only half of Lamalera's soul. The ignorance on the part of outsiders, even the government itself, could certainly make any efforts to help these whale hunters fruitless, even endangering their very existence. The outsiders do not know that kotekelema (sperm whale in their native language) and the barter system cannot be separated, both being the entire soul of Lamalera. Should whaling be stopped, the barter system would instantly disappear, thus bringing the whole village to misery.

From the sociological perspective, the "bravery" of the Lamalera whale hunters in subduing these sea leviathans using very primitive technology is as unimaginable as the resilience of the barter institution in the age of globalization. Lamalera, even Lembata Island, is a unique example of a dualistic society where barter (a pre-capitalistic element) and money (a capitalistic element) coexist in harmony.

One of my important findings in my doctoral field survey about bartering in Lamalera (2007-2008) was that sperm whales and other cetaceans are the main factor that allows bartering to survive amid today's "money mania". This is in connection with the peledang (whaling boat) institution collectively owned by the suku (clan) and the traditional pattern of whale redistribution.

The whales captured are enjoyed by all clan members, then through a traditional reciprocity pattern (bfene and lamma) are distributed to the whole village, and through a barter network finally distributed all over Lembata Island, even to Adonara and the eastern tip of Flores Island. The Lamalera people believe that whales and other big fish are "sent" by their forefathers to support the life of kide-knuke (poor people) and widows in Lamalera and all the people living around Labalekang Mountain. Bartering thus has a social character, in contrast with the calculating character of the money economy.

Small fish caught by means of modern instruments such as nets do not support the barter optimally because they are identical with money, as this kind of activity is more individualistic in nature (based on capital/cash credit). The saying "without whales, Lamalera will perish" should be understood in relation to the barter institution and peledang (whaling boats): without whales, the Lamalera people lack the best commodity to barter with foodstuffs from the hinterland with the implication that they will suffer immensely and could possibly "perish".

My field research in Posiwatu, Imulolo, Puor, and Boto (the nearest barter partners in the hinterlands) showed sperm whales could not be replaced by any other kind of fish. As fish from Lewoleba or Wulandoni are sold for cash, mountain people are more interested in bartering their food staples with sperm whale or other big fish from Lamalera. Moreover, they feel that bartering with Lamalera people is their traditional way of helping each other since ancestral times. So in Lembata, even in the entire Lamaholot community, bartering is not an economic system, but primarily part of the custom of reciprocity.

Whaling in Lamalera cannot be questioned because of three legal foundations: first, ILO Convention 169, the Brundtland Report (1992), the Rio Declaration (1992), and Agenda 21, which acknowledge the rights of aboriginal people to pursue and develop their way of life; second, Indonesia is not a member state of the International Whaling Commission (IWC), meaning it need not adhere to its rulings; third, the 1986 whaling moratorium is aimed at commercial whaling. Whaling in Lamalera is aboriginal subsistence whaling to meet local nutritional, subsistence and cultural needs.

Lamalera whaling is part of an effort to utilize the ecological richness to prosper. The Savu Sea with its rich biodiversity, such as big mammals, support the life of the Lamalera people in the same way as rich soil in the hinterlands supports that of farmers. In principle, the conservation of the Savu Sea should be hailed as benefiting the coastal communities, including Lamalera. The numbers of manta rays, sharks and turtles have decreased sharply for the past 10 years because of the use of explosives and poison by outsiders.

Traditional whaling in Lamalera is part of local wisdom to preserve the environment. The local taboo to hunt blue whales (an endangered species) is an expression of local wisdom to preserve big marine mammals. Traditional whaling in Lamalera waters is really the act of conservation itself. So the way the Lamalera people catch whales nowadays should be conserved too, which in turn conserves the barter system.

The writer is a PhD candidate in sociology from the University of Indonesia, conducting his doctoral research on the barter system in Lamalera between 2007 and 2008.