SUBSISTENCE AGRICULTURE AND NUTRITION IN THE BIMIN VALLEY, OKSAPMIN SUB‐DISTRICT, PAPUA NEW GUINEA

Abstract

The agricultural economy of the Mountain Okspeaking people of Oksapmin and Telefomin districts has been very little studied. There has been work by Barth (1971; 1975), Morren (1977; 1979; 1981)and Hyndman (1982; 1984) among the Baktaman, Miyanmin and Wopkairnin, respectively ; but all three are fringe groups of hunter-gatherer-cultivators, inhabiting forested terrain at lower altitudes and at much lower population densities than are typical of the highlands region. The highlanders inhabiting the mountain valleys and karst basins west of the Strickland Gorge and between the Sepik and Fly headwaters have been much less researched, except from the points of view of art, ritual and social organization. A better understanding of the agricultural economy of this region is now needed, since its problems of infant malnutrition, lack of cash cropping opportunities and selective out-migration are becoming increasingly prominent (Bourke, 1979; Cape, 1980, 1981; Morren, 1981; Heywood & Nakikus, 1982). The region is also of interest since it is now undergoing an Ipomoean Revolution, or transition from taro to sweet potato, which elsewhere in the Highlands was accomplished two or three hundred years ago (Golson, 1982; Bayliss-Smith, 1985). In this paper some preliminary data are presented for the Bimin-Kuskusmin group occupying the Bimin Valley, south of Oksapmin.