Conhecimento ecológico, regras de uso e manejo local dos recursos naturais na pesca do alto-médio São Francisco, MG.
Resumen
The use of nature by local communities is based in a set of knowledge, practices and
believes, developed through human culture and historical experience with the environment.
Small-scale commercial fishermen from Upper-Medium São Francisco River, object of this
study, are influenced by the dynamics of the environment cycle and by the ecology and
biology of fishery resources, maintaining a very close relationship with them, for developing
new knowledge and understandings which can provide better conditions of survive. More
than that, the small-scale fishermen have self-organized for planning and practicing local
management of fishery resources, which include local rules or institutions which define the
rights and duties in the access and use of resources. The study of local ecological knowledge
and common property systems developed by these communities are the mainly goal of
ethnoecology science and of researches in common property systems, which support them as
alternatives to the traditional scientific ecology and management of natural resources. This
research was carried out between 1999 and 2001 with 7 field trips of 15 days each. Open and
structured interviews were carried out, complemented by direct observation of the fishing
activity, and the collect of fishery yield. The small-scale fishermen of Upper-Medium São
Francisco River have demonstrated to pursue a detailed comprehension about the ecology and
biology of the aquatic system and its fishery resources, on which they have based their
fishery practices and common property systems, expecting to guarantee efficiency with
sustainability. These local ecological knowledge and practices can contribute to develop a
new interdisciplinary scientific view about ecology and management, putting together
scientific and local experiences to produce a better use of natural resources, for these and the
next generations.