University of Georgia doctoral candidate, Victoria C. Ramenzoni, with the guidance of Dr. Bram Tucker, will undertake research on the effects of increased access to information on subsistence-related decision making. Her research will address the question of how forecasts and estimations of uncertainty in terms of probabilities and covariation rules explain economic behavior including production activities and resource use in artisinal fishing communities.
Ramenzoni's research will be carried out in Endeh, Flores Island, Indonesia, where she will collect data to determine the extent to which subjective estimations about uncertainty (covariation inferences and probabilistic representations) explain economic behavior including production activities and resource use. Specific research questions include: 1) How do Endehnese fishermen conceive of ecological processes (physical, atmospheric, and meteorological) affecting fishing stocks and catches? 2) What forms do fishermen's predictions of weather, climatic events, and ecological processes take? 3) How do fishermen's estimations of weather, climate events, ecological processes, and their own productive efficiency influence the time they spend fishing? Data collection methods will include a combination of ethnographic, observational, and experimental tools. Results will be analyzed through multivariate and bivariate statistics, and content analysis techniques.
The research is important because it will increase modeling predictability and theoretical power for understanding subsistence behavior. Study findings will illuminate the effects that everyday subsistence decision-making has on economic transitions and conservation initiatives. The research also will provide human behavioral evidence for conservation and governmental programs concerned with managing endangered fisheries and preventing overfishing by conceptualizing people's needs and realities through a culturally sensitive lens. Funding this research supports the education of a graduate student and the training of two undergraduate students from the University of Gadjah Mada, Yogyakarta, Indonesia, fostering international research communication and collaboration.
This project explored how fishermen in Ende, Indonesia, are being affected by uncertainty due to climatic and economic change. The main goal was to determine the extent to which people’s beliefs about the changes in future climatic conditions explain work effort and nutritional decisions including production activities and resource use. Despite numerous research on the projections of climate change in agricultural production in Southeast Asia, there is still uncertainty about the impacts of marine species modifications in diets of coastal populations. In addition, local institutions do not have enough information about people’s beliefs and preferences regarding resource use and future climatic trends that ultimately affect a population’s health and environmental status. Lack of knowledge can have acute repercussions in the design of health and development policies that are looking into the mitigation of future exposed coastal areas. I relied on anthropometric measurements of weight changes, ecological assessments, surveys and interviews to study decisions about resource use and nutrition. Overall, my research has led me to discover that climate change is affecting the time fishermen spent fishing. For example, contrary to other studies, fishermen do not follow the moon cycle that closely anymore. That means that their previous knowledge about fish behavior and abundance is not effective. They are being exposed to risks more frequently, like typhoons and cyclones, and they do not rely on fishing calendars like in the past. In addition, i found that their nutritional status is not affected by the seasons as much as i predicted and that their overall diet seems to be better suited to deal with energetic stresses than farming populations in the same region. I also discovered that damaging fishing practices are being employed frequently. This responds to lack of options in employment and sustainable livelihoods. Findings are very significant for policy design and bring new perspectives into how to approach mitigation measures. They also expand our knowledge on the theory of fishing behavior, emphasizing the importance of longitudinal panel studies to understand what guides fishing effort allocation.
