“Some sea gypsies’communities became sedentary inPhuketpartly (but not only) due to the attraction of revenues from the tourism industry Apart from being in themselves a (debatable) tourist attraction, they provide cheaplabour(often the cheapest next to Burmese migrant workers) They also use their boats for sea transportation of tourists to the islands of the bay ofChalongandRawai On the other hand some other sea Gypsies communities (moving along the Andaman coast) still have more or less their original livelihoods strategies mostly based on fishing and harvesting seashells The latter proved to be quite resilient and there are accounts of communities that literally escaped the Tsunami thanks to indigenous knowledge It is important to consider these differences and even take into account andutiliseindigenous knowledge when appropriate in the recovery phase ” (Livelihood Recovery & Environmental Rehabilitation, report of UNDP / World Bank / FAO Joint Tsunami Disaster Assessment Mission 4 ‐8 January 2005)