Construção de indicadores etnobiológicos para monitoramento participativo da diversidade biológica

Abstract

The loss of biological diversity is one of the main environmental problems of our time. Given this scenario, the creation of protected areas has been the main strategy to try to conserve natural resources and contain the loss of biological diversity. Despite the increase in the number of protected areas in Brazil and in the world, many criticisms have been made regarding the effectiveness of this conservation strategy in the face of the persistent decline of biological diversity. To mitigate these losses, international agreements such as the Convention on Biological Diversity have established that systematic monitoring and use of indicators are key strategies for monitoring trends in species abundance and distribution, and assessing the conservation status of species. Indicators are tools that simplify the complexity of a set of available data and information, facilitate communication, and contribute to decision making. In general, monitoring systems are carried out by specialists (i.e. researchers or protected area officials), however, the scarcity of financial resources of environmental agencies to maintain the teams of researchers and volunteers is seen as an important limitation of this type of approach. In this sense, studies have advocated the incorporation of local ecological knowledge of local populations living in protected areas around the monitoring process, since these people continually observe and monitor various signs and symptoms related to environmental changes and the influence of these changes on the conservation status of the species. In the surroundings of a conservation unit in the Northeast of Brazil live human populations that depend on the extraction of non-timber forest products for income generation, especially the Caryocar coriaceum Wittm extraction. (pequi) and Himatanthus drasticus (Mart.) Plumel. (janaguba), both species of great socioeconomic and cultural importance. Thus, the present study was carried out in a conservation unit in the Northeast of Brazil and had the following objectives: (i) to identify which indicators the local extractivists observe to evaluate the state of conservation of the species; (ii) to evaluate whether socioeconomic factors influence knowledge about indicators; and (iii) to analyze the extractivists' perception of the history of environmental changes that have been taking place in the study area and how these changes have affected the conservation status of the species. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 61 extractivists aged between 31 and 79 years, to access the knowledge extracted by pequi and janaguba extractivists about the indicators and whether social factors such as age, sex and time of experience influence this knowledge. In this case, extractivists observed indicators related to management practices, changes in the population structure of the species, changes in the region's climate and environmental changes. In general, the socioeconomic factors evaluated do not influence the distribution of knowledge among the extractivists, suggesting that the local ecological knowledge about the observed indicators and the evaluation of the state of conservation of the species is diffused and communicated between people of both sexes, and Of different generations and levels of experience in extractive activity. To achieve the third objective, participatory workshops were held, and the results showed that the extractivists have a broad knowledge of the environmental changes that are occurring in the region due to changes in the management regime of the conservation unit. For the extractivists, these changes have negatively affected the pequi populations, being considered as threatened of local extinction. Based on the results of this study, we consider that the local ecological knowledge of the extractivists, coming from observations over many generations, has the potential to be incorporated in monitoring programs and evaluation of the state of conservation of species, promoting the inclusion and recognition of local populations in decision-making in biodiversity conservation strategies.