Nadia Vanessa Parreira

The monitoring activities carried out by the NGO Amaz’nia Nativa (OPAN) on the rivers of the Juruena Basin (Mato Grosso-Brazil) have shown that the projects for the installation of hydroelectric power plants underway in this region have compromised the environmental sustainability and sociocultural integrity of several local communities, manly$ indigenous peoples. This organization also emphasizes that the technical feasibility studies and licensing processes related to these projects are taking place without the adequate participation of the local communities affected by them, who have the right to free and informed consultations prior to any technical, political or economic decision on their lands. In this context, OPAN and the Ethnographic Experimentation Laboratory of the Federal University of S’o Carlos began a collaboration to design an engaged research project that monitors the undertakings of hydroelectric power plant entrepreneurs and financiers in the Juruena River Basin, in order to map the connections of these ventures with the agribusiness production chain. Our expectation is that the results of this project can help build a public database to increase access to information and a better participation of local communities in decision-making processes on regional development projects.