REFLECTIONS ON THE SOCIOECONOMIC ASPECTS OF DESERTIFICATION
Most studies on the desertification process has in common a concern about the factorsof the natural picture, leaving in the background the socioeconomic issues. From theunderstanding that this phenomenon is resulting from the relation between the anthropicaction and physical aspects of a given area,...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Editora da Universidade Federal de Uberlândia
2005-05-01
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| Series: | Revista Sociedade & Natureza |
| Online Access: | http://www.sociedadenatureza.ig.ufu.br/include/getdoc.php?id=1528&article=777&mode=pdf |
| Summary: | Most studies on the desertification process has in common a concern about the factorsof the natural picture, leaving in the background the socioeconomic issues. From theunderstanding that this phenomenon is resulting from the relation between the anthropicaction and physical aspects of a given area, as pointed out at the International Convention forthe Fight Against Desertification, which understands as desertification “the land degradationin the arid, semiarid and dry sub-humid zones resulting from several factors, includingclimatic variations and human activities (UNO, 1994)”, other elements started to beincorporated in the researches on desertification. There is, evidently, a close relation betweenthe use of natural resources of fragile ecosystems and the environmental degradation whichcan lead to desertification. From that assumption emerges the need to think that thesocioeconomic indicators are the most adequate in the studies on the thematic, in search of theconstruction of more consistent references.The present essay has as its goal to propose some reflections on that issue,emphasizing man’s relation as agent and, at the same time, victim of desertification. Thediscussion about this theme becomes necessary, since the populations introduce themselves inthe environment as units that practice and suffer the action, being the people who survive on agiven ecosystem those directly affected by the environmental degradation. |
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| ISSN: | 0103-1570 1982-4513 |