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An assessment of the metabolic profile implied by agricultural change in two rural communities in the North of Argentina

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Abstract

The soy expansion model in Argentina generates structural changes in traditional lifestyles, which can be associated with different biophysical and socioeconomic impacts. To explore this issue, we apply an innovative method for integrated assessment—the multi-scale integrated analysis of societal and ecosystem metabolism framework—to characterize two communities in the Chaco Region, Province of Formosa, North of Argentina. These communities have recently experienced the expansion of soy production, altering their economic activity, energy consumption patterns, land use and human time allocation. The integrated characterization presented in the paper illustrates the differences (biophysical, socioeconomic and historical) between the two communities that can be associated with different responses. The analysis of the factors behind these differences has important policy implications for the sustainable development of local communities in the area.

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Notes

  1. The questionnaire applied can be found in supplementary documents.

  2. Argentina does not officially use the term ‘indigenous’, but rather ‘aboriginal’ population. We use the term indigenous, which is more frequent in Latin America.

  3. The indigenous called criollos to the inhabitants that colonized their land.

  4. The small producers have less than 10 hectares.

  5. Every defined area has in general one property that could be one extended family (meaning two or more households).

  6. A traditional drink.

  7. The distribution considers an urban area in the center and the chacras around this area.

  8. Activities mainly related to women’s roles such as caring of children, preparing food, cleaning the house.

  9. Roundup Ready Soybeans. The Roundup Ready® seeds contain in-plant tolerance to Roundup® agricultural herbicides, allowing growers to spray Roundup agricultural herbicides to kill the weeds without harming the crop.

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Acknowledgments

We are very grateful to the following institutions for their help with this research: GEPAMA (University of Buenos Aires), the Qom community “La Primavera” and Tacaaglé’s community, MOCAFOR. We also acknowledge support from (i) the Catalan Government for a FI Scholarship, the Emergent Research Group on “Integrated Assessment: sociology, technology and the environment” SGR2009-042496 and the Consolidated Research Group on “Economic Institutions, Quality of Life and the Environment,” SGR2009-00962; (ii) the European Commission, EuropeAid Cooperation Office funded Alfa project Sustainable Use of Photosynthesis Products&Optimum Resource Transformation (SUPPORT); (iii) the EU funded project Synergies in Multi-Scale Interlinkages of Eco-Social Systems (SMILE, Contract 217213-FP7-2007-SSH-1); and (iv) the Spanish Ministry for Science and Innovation Project HAR–2010–20684–C02–01 and MSOCA-CSO2010-21979. Finally, we thank Liana Williams for proofreading and for very helpful comments.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Programa de Postgrado de Antropología Social (PPAS), Universidad Nacional de Misiones, Posadas, Argentina

    Nancy Arizpe

  2. Institut de Ciència i Tecnologia Ambientals (ICTA), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Edifici Ciències, Torre Àrea 9, 4a planta. C5-438, C.P. 08193, Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain

    Nancy Arizpe, Jesús Ramos-Martín & Mario Giampietro

  3. Departament d’Economia i d’Història Econòmica, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain

    Jesús Ramos-Martín

  4. Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats (ICREA), Barcelona, Spain

    Mario Giampietro

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  1. Nancy Arizpe
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Correspondence to Nancy Arizpe.

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Arizpe, N., Ramos-Martín, J. & Giampietro, M. An assessment of the metabolic profile implied by agricultural change in two rural communities in the North of Argentina. Environ Dev Sustain 16, 903–924 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10668-014-9532-y

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