Trading images? A comment on Ponte's reassessment of agrarian change in the Uluguru Mountains

Abstract

Stefano Ponte's article in the first JMAS issue of 2001 brings good news: previous pessimistic accounts of the dynamics of economic life in the Uluguru Mountains, especially mine, have to be revised (Ponte 2001; van Donge 1993c). There may have been economic decline in the area, but economic liberalisation has turned that around and raised incomes. Ponte collected rich material, especially in his household survey. Whereas I found it difficult to get precise estimates of money, land, and so on from people there, he collected precise quantitative insights. This information covers not only their present situation: people recalled with considerable precision their situation back to the mid eighties when I did research there. His critique touches, however, not only changes over time, but also the assumptions about how actors behave: people are much more resourceful than I portrayed them.