Cuiva - Economy

Subsistence and Division of Labor. Unlike most modern hunter-gatherers, the Cuiva live in a rich environment, and, because of this, offer perhaps the best illustration of an economy that has been described as the "original affluent society." Women produce vegetables, which are gathered during the dry season on the edge of the savannas, and men hunt animals, which are mostly caught in or near the rivers; fruits can be collected by either sex in the forest during the rainy season. Food is shared among all in a camp. In return for a week of work that never exceeds twenty hours, each Cuiva eats a daily average of a pound of meat and a pound of either fruits or vegetables. Their technology is probably one of the simplest in the world, as it includes little more than hammocks, canoes, bows and arrows, digging sticks, baskets, bark cloth, and strings.