Book Description

The rainforest zone in Brazil is under pressure through encroachment of farming and other sectors, which lead to ecologically unbalanced development, reducing the living potential of indigenous communities. The Bananal Island wetland is located in the transition zone between the Amazon and Cerrado (Savannah) ecosystems. The conflicting interest of the rural actors on using the natural resources lead to the demarcation of most of its territory as Indigenous Lands. This book attempts to analyze the socio-economic potentials of indigenous and non-indigenous systems presented in the adjacent zone of Bananal Island, along the Javae River. Special emphasis is given to the relationship of the indigenous communities with smallholders expelled out of the island and large-scale farm and ranch systems; and how this relationship may affect the living standard of the two less economically favorable groups. The results show that for indigenous communities some of the actions of the government had improved a few components of their living standard raising them up to the level of smallholders and the fishermen found in the region. The smallholders were allocated in settlements. The poor infrastructure of the settlement studied and the absence of financial incentives for agricultural activities push these smallholders to establish small enterprises in order to guarantee their living standard. The large-scale farms and ranches are mainly market oriented and are dependent mostly on the national economic fluctuation. They are high dependent of external labour to run their production activities. There is a concern about the scarcity of specialized technical labour in the region. The training of the smallholders could fill this gap and avoid future encroachments into Bananal Island as occurred in the past.