Agroforestry and Forestry in Sulawesi series: Unravelling rural migration networks: land-tenure arrangements among Bugis migrant communities in Southeast Sulawesi

Spontaneous rural-to-rural migration has many impacts on every dimension of human life. Migration
driven by the hunger for land has been stimulated by the development of high economic value crops.
The study of migration networks will contribute to a better portrait of continuing migration and the
related actors: their influence on the decision to migrate and their role in facilitating the migration.
This study focussed on Bugis migrant communities-famous as great wanderers-in Southeast
Sulawesi Province, Indonesia. In the province, smallholders’ cocoa plantations are dominated by
Bugis migrants, contributing two-thirds of the total 137 833 tonnes of cocoa production in 2010.
Research was conducted at the migrants’ destination (Konawae District) and origin (Sinjai District).
The study showed that the main motivation for Bugis to migrate was to obtain land. The three main
waves of migration to Southeast Sulawesi are characterized by development of a major commodity in
each time period: 1) the ‘green revolution’ with paddy-rice development in the 1970s–80s; 2) the
cocoa boom in early (1980s–2000s) and late phases (2000s until present). Four migration network
patterns were deliberately or unintentionally developed by the Bugis migrant community: 1) kinship
network; 2) patron–client relationship; 3) migration owing to work displacement; and 4) the pioneer
migration: early migrants who have lived in Southeast Sulawesi for a long time. In each wave, the
central actor in the migration is the land broker, linking different villages and families.