Abstract
Commercial agriculture in the Pacific has typically resulted in increased monoculture, reliance on purchased food, and environmental degradation. This is particularly the case on Taveuni Island, Fiji, a wellknown hotspot for commercial taro enterprises. Using ethnographic data on the agricultural landscape in an indigenous Fijian community there, I demonstrate how the community maintains a degree of crop diversity and flexible land-use arrangements despite the sweeping effects of exportbased farming practices. The capacity for diversity and flexibility, I argue, is sustained in a landscape consisting of hilly terrain with fragmented gardens, which enables the community to respond resiliently to the disciplining influence of commercial agriculture, even while engaging in many of its practices. I also point out that the everyday acts of walking and seeing in the rugged landscape are neglected aspects of farming that allow the villagers to maintain a profound connection to an environment filled with meaning, memories, and a sense of time. This agricultural landscape is forever a complex social space, rather than a place defined solely by commercial productivity. The results of this study show how resilience may be cultivated in indigenous agricultural systems even given the impact of globalization.