Tripang

These consisted of tripang (sea slugs), Swift bird's nest for soup on Chinese lauriat tables, tortoise shells (an environmental mortal sin today!), pearls and nacre (mother of pearl).

This trade involved eastern Indonesia's highly coveted spices (cloves, nutmeg, mace), aromatic woods (cinnamon, sandalwood), and sea products (tortoiseshell, tripang, or beche-de-mer) (Andaya 2011).

At the beginning of the nineteenth century, there was an infusion of ethnically diverse captive people among the Balangingi--mostly through demands for their labor on raiding prahus and in the tripang and pearl fisheries--that complicated the identity of the Samal populations.

Women are now largely confined to harvesting the less valuable marine resources such as agar seaweed or beche de mer (tripang).