ifoam'96 Book of Abstracts 11th IFOAM Scientific Conference 11-15 August 1996, Copenhagen, Denmark

ECOWEB FRONT PAGE SUBJECT INDEX AUTHOR INDEX

Posters

Rapid and Participatory Environmental Appraisal. P1; 112

AS-PTA- Assessoria e Servicos a Projetos em Agricultura Alternativa. Rua da Candelaria, 9/604. Centro. Rio de Janeiro-RJ. zip 20.091-020 Brazil

The sustainable planing and management of lands from a determined region calls for the knowledge about the stratification of the diferent environmental unities. These environmental unities in the tropics have great diversity, mainly in areas of small holdings, that also show a great socioeconomical variety much more complex than in areas of latifundia. The identification of these landscapes unities, needs a detailed approach about its localization.
In Brazil, as a rule, the works done on environmental stratification, usually soil surveys, are of general scales and not adequated to local planning at farm level or at small farmers communities level, although they are very important as a basic information. Besides the scale problem, there is another one, that is the need to transfer the knowledge to the farmer, the most interested on the study.
The farmer, especially the small ones, have a great understand about the productivity qualities of the lands from their region. Their informations are very much contextualised because their logic of land management and use depends on the integration of the biophysical environmental with socioeconomical aspects. Thats the reason why is so important to systematize and to give value to the local knowledge for the environmental qualities characterization of agricultural areas.
Individuals or collectives semi-strutured interviews are the basis of this appraisal. With this approach, it is possible to incorporate a valuable set of informations about farmer's logical land use. In Brazil, it was applied in two different regions by AS-PTA staff. One in the Northeast Region, on Paraiba State, and other in the Southeast Region, on Minas Gerais State. Results shows a very interesting option to strengthen farmers and technicians knowlodge about the region, helping to the sustainable land use participatory planning.

Petersen, P. (1996): Diagnostico Ambiental Rapido e Participativo; levantando informacoes e mobilizando a comunidade para um manejosustentavel das terras. Alternativas - Cadernos de Agroecologia. AS-PTA, Rio de Janeiro.