Interactive Discussion

From Manuel Morales Mite on Knowledge Management

Chapter 30 of the Science Panel for the Amazon report addresses the new bioeconomy in the Amazon context. The chapter accurately summarizes the alternatives to the traditional extractive economy that have prevailed in the region during the last decades and elaborates on the challenges those alternatives must overcome to have an impact on changing the productive matrix. 

 

Several important points emerge from this analysis. First of all, social-ecological inequalities must be addressed to halt the destruction of biodiversity and ecosystems in the region. The local inhabitants of the Amazon region must benefit from the economic gains produced by the different productive activities from which they participate in a way that their basic needs are properly addressed. This is not an easy task, of course, given the deficiencies in technology, access to markets and credit, and other caveats. Corruption on the value chain and the prevalence of perverse social-economic dynamics are the factors that most significantly hinder this process. Conservation advocates might help address this dynamic by bringing information and knowledge to the people at different levels; this information and knowledge must help the producers access innovative processes and technology that maximizes their production and economic gain. At the same time, it is vital to mobilize public opinion by creating awareness about the importance of fostering and maintaining a sustainable management process in the Amazon region. The chapter mentions the creation of seals of quality and the use of technology for the user to track the origin of their products, a process that has a great potential to be replicated in other amazonian areas (besides Brazilian Amazon) and elsewhere. I believe it is key to influence people´s behavioral changes that promote the use of certified products and discourage their participation in destructive activities, including participation in illegal markets. 

 

The thing that stood the most for me in this analysis is that the authors state that the Amazon must always be presented in its plurality, meaning recognizing its diversity and complex social-ecological realities that vary from one region to another. With this in mind, the chapter also highlights the need to have pan-amazonian laws and regulations for the use and commercialization of forest products, timber, agricultural products, and even other alternatives, like tourism and carbon markets. It is essential, from my perspective, for the Amazonian countries and territories to have a “common language” that allows for international cooperation (in legal terms), allowing at the same time for the local municipalities to adjust those regulations to their own environment. The most challenging thing in this endeavor is the enormous biodiversity that the Amazon basin harbors and recognizing the variation in its diversity from one area to another while taking advantage of the different products that each sub-region or zone may offer. This is a titanic task in which scientific and conservationists may help, through research and collaboration, with proper support from the government(s) and international cooperation. The potential for alternative agricultural and timber products and medicine and fisheries production is in its infancy in most Amazonian regions. It is precisely here where the potential for a biocultural economy resides.