Sustentabilidade de uma propriedade rural de base ecológica: um estudo de caso no Sítio Oliveira em Rio Claro/SP

Abstract

Most of the territorial space of a city is used for agricultural purposes like crops, livestock or forest and a considerable amount of ecological problems are related to such activities, which, as productive processes, are closely linked to the dynamics of ecosystems and certain social relationships of production. In agriculture, sustainability is a guiding element in the search for a new ethic in the relationship between man and nature. A major challenge for farmers and researchers is to know when an agroecosystems is healthy, how healthy is a system after conversion into an agroecological management and, more importantly, how to achieve a sustainable agroecosystem. Thus, studies that examine the sustainability of farms with ecological production systems, from the perspective of agroecology, through methodologies such as Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) and Indicators of sustainability, are extremely important to verify the operation of these systems, their influence on the improvement of environmental resources and the dissemination and encouragement of more sustainable practices in food production and other products. In this study were used six tools of PRA: Semi-structured interview, Maps of the farm, Venn s Diagram, Agricultural Calendar with focus on gender, Commercial Flowchart and Problem Tree, which served as input for obtaining information with a high degree of relevance in the development of forty-four indicators of different dimensions of sustainability (environmental, socio-cultural and economic), which were grouped into four broad themes (Quality and use of land and water, Land use and conservation, Quality of life and Economic vulnerability). The Radar Chart made possible to plot the state of the elements of the ecosystem, promoting an integrated and systemic evaluation. There were an intense exchange of information and experiences in which the views of researchers and farmers complemented themselves and generated responses more suited to the local reality.