Necessity of Productive Association with Technological Innovations for Sustainability of Extractive Reserves in the Amazon

The first extractive reserves (RESEXs) have completed 32 years of foundation and still encounter environmental and socioeconomic problems. Hence, this study aims to evaluate whether integrating technologies to the productive activities of extractivism, agriculture, and animal husbandry improves the lives of local communities and reduces environmental resource impact. The study employs the association method because more than two variables in the set of environmental, economic, social, and institutional groups manifested a relationship of dependence. Hence, we conclude that the most suitable strategy associates plant extraction, agriculture, and animal husbandry with technological innovations indicated for this model.


Introduction
The Amazon is undergoing an intense transition and the emergence of new paradigms on both the use of its resources and its status as an ideal model for environmental and socioeconomic development (Spínola & Carneiro Filho, 2019). Establishing a sustainable economy has never been consolidated, leading to a situation wherein conservation and forest development remain dependent on external resources (Garrett et al., 2021).
Biodiversity conservation and economic revenue can be balanced to responsibly manage ecological and economic compensation in biologically valuable regions (Ball et al., 2020). Local communities in the Amazon depend on logging and non-timber forest resources for food and other basic needs (Evangelista-Vale et al., 2021).
Institutional decisions must be flexible in fulfilling the mission of conservation units (CUs) to guide a new research agenda on conservation and development (Bauch, Sills, & Pattanayk, 2014;Prado, Seixas, & Futemma, public policies for investments in infrastructure, maintenance of natural resources, and economic livelihoods of local communities depending on agroextractive activities (Medeiros et al., 2021;Hoffmann et al., 2021).
However, despite being in operation for 32 years, the oldest RESEXs in the Amazon still face the challenges of sustainably combining the productive activities of extractivism, agriculture, and creation of large and small animals persist (Freitas et al., 2021). Producers encounter difficulties in maintaining productive activities due to low productivity, subsistence conditions, and poor economic performance, owing to a lack of institutional support, incentives, and technical guidance for production (Seabra, 2021).
Additionally, deforestation is growing in almost all RESEXs to develop productive activities, as the seasonal activity of extractivism does not solely guarantee survival. Intensifying deforestation means a setback to achieving the goals set in the National Climate Change Policy (Jesus & Catojo, 2020). CUs are at risk, owing to anthropic increases, weakening of environmental legislation, and inefficient institutional management (Sales et al., 2020).
Furthermore, recognizing the interaction between the economic system and the environment is essential as the economic efficiency advocated by the conventional economy does not always represent social justice and income distribution (Florentino, Silva, & Freitas, 2016). Additionally, financial investment, innovative dynamics, and poverty reduction are needed to secure food security and subsistence in local communities (Cavalcante Filho et al., 2020).
Families cannot survive with low productivity, low profitability of extractive activity conditions, and the difficult logistics of processing and transportation. This makes subsistence insufficient (Barbosa & Moret, 2016). Combining extractivism, agriculture, and large and small animal husbandry with technological innovations is fundamental for the subsistence of inhabitants and the regional economy (Baia, Freitas, & Silva, 2020;Teixeira et al., 2018).
Thus, why are institutions not subsidizing local communities of RESEXs with environmental and socioeconomic projects to utilize primary and secondary forests and reduce deforestation with technologies suitable for extractivism, agriculture, and animal husbandry activities? This study aims to evaluate whether integrating technologies with the productive activities of extractivism, agriculture, and animal husbandry improves the lives of local communities and reduces the environmental resource impact.
The remainder of this paper is organized as follows. Section 2 presents the materials, methods, and their respective subdivisions: research subjects, study delineation, specific procedures, and data analysis. In Section 3, we analyze the data based on the primary collection and approach of the study. In Section 4, we validate and discuss our results in the context of the existing literature. Finally, we present the conclusions and suggestions of this study in Section 5.

Research Subjects
The RESEXs of Alto Juruá (Marechal Thaumaturgo/Acre), Rio Ouro Preto (Guajará-Mirim and Nova Mamoré/Rondônia), and Rio Cajari (Laranjal do Jari, Mazagão, and Vitória do Jari/Amapá) were studied based on groups of environmental, economic, social, and institutional variables. We considered the criterion covering 32 years of existence, sociocultural potential, biological diversity, and experience between the state and local communities. The Amazon and RESEXs receive interference from scientists, environmentalists, activists, managers, and tax authorities of national, international, and environmental institutions. These events specifically occur due to deforestation and loss of fauna, flora, and/or environmental resources. However, no effective methods have yet been presented that integrate forest conservation with the improvement of the local inhabitants' living conditions.
Exclusive preference for natural resources is not sufficient to ensure that the forest is intact or standing, as deforestation continues in the three oldest RESEXs in the Amazon, created in 1990. RESEX Rio Ouro Preto was the smallest in population and territory; however, this has experienced greater deforestation than the others, especially until 2005. Cattle are the predominant productive activity in nearby roads-Bom Sossego, Cachoeirinha, and Pompeu-causing the greatest environmental damage. Owing to questions of conflicts of interest, Bill No. 10.493-C of 2018 (Federal Senate) is in progress, which authorizes in in the wake of common agreement the dismemberment of 20,462 hectares of RESEX Rio Ouro Preto.
Thus, RESEXs Alto Juruá and Rio Cajari have similar territorial dimensions; however, their populations are disproportionate. The former includes a greater number of inhabitants, cattle culture, and agriculture, which justifies the rate of deforestation in the periods studied. The second, in addition to cattle, has production and investment in Brazilian nuts, which explains its lower rate of deforestation compared to Alto Juruá and Rio Ouro Preto. Highlighting that the three RESEXs reared cattle herds and buffaloes is important, and the founding strategy did not allow for expansion of this productive activity.

Discussion
Associating plant extraction with agriculture, large and small animal husbandry (in a sustainable way), and its technologies contribute to environmental and socioeconomic sustainability of local inhabitants and have a low impact on natural and environmental resources. However, public policies for income transfers (e.g., PSA and productive activities, such as extractivism, agriculture, and cattle), in isolation, have not guaranteed the subsistence of local populations.
This situation demonstrates that public policies for income transfers do not outweigh the families' needs and cannot collaborate with development and conservation (Araújo et al., 2017). For example, payment programs for environmental services (PSA) and carbon credits (CC) provide environmental services and defend carbon stocks' potential but ignore the traditions, culture, and livelihood of forest dwellers (Pereira, 2010;Yanai et al., 2016).
Instead of creating diffused or artificial markets (sale of carbon credits or environmental services), creating technological and economic alternatives would lead to greater production of food and raw materials with less environmental damage to various rural regions of the Amazon (Homma, 2020). The PSA experience in RESEXs was not successful as the Bolsa Verde Program benefited some families with 300.00 BRL (every three months), but this ended in 2018. We complement the fact that retirements, Bolsa Família, and Seguro Defeso (government transfers) are significant in the sustainability strategy of several families.
Another factor hindering socioeconomic sustainability is the worsening of rural communities' food conditions owing to the lack of commitment and awareness of public institutions . These conclusions confirm the field evidence, and we add that the conducted projects have a high priority for ecosystem resources and low preference for quality of life.
Socioeconomic vulnerability and social inequality have increased considerably in these areas (Oliveira, Andrade, & Souza, 2020;Rocha et al., 2020;Jaeggi et al., 2021). Moreover, the effectiveness of programs and projects (Thuy et al., 2020) have not been empirically proven, given that the implemented public policies do not correspond to local communities' socioeconomic needs (Alves-Pinto et al., 2018;Silva, Meneghetti, & Pinheiro, 2020). These fundamentals were verified in our data collection as the state did not demonstrate medium-and long-term projects with viability to improve inhabitants' living conditions.
To alleviate the social gap, productive practices should be guaranteed, public policies promoted and reformulated (Vela et al., 2020), or impact on per capita income reduced (Pham et al., 2021). These actions would reduce inequality, exclusion, participation, access to funds, and credits (Haas, Loft, & Pham, 2019) and would not disregard the added value to the environment and opportunity cost of community participation (Ram, 2019). These failures in planning, management, control, and effectiveness make the achievement of social well-being and reduction of the annual rate of deforestation of the RESEXs difficult.
Furthermore, the integrated production of both timber and non-timber products are alternatives that can allow sustainable flow (Klimas et al., 2012), provided that these respect local culture, interact with nature, integrate socioeconomic and ecological factors (Gaoque et al., 2016), and cooperate with the construction of regional markets (Sangalli et al., 2021). These elements are idealized by local communities; however, they lack the ability, knowledge, and institutional understanding to ensure truly sustainable RESEXs.
For example, integrated or combined production of extractivism, agriculture, and livestock can be instrumental in conserving the rural landscape, income, and food security (Bulege, 2011;Dick et al., 2021;Fraxe et al., 2018), under the condition of including social actors to new forms of leadership (Granada, 2015;Cortés, 2015) and addressing social and environmental issues (Ruiz-Pérez et al., 2005;Carmenta, Coudel, & Steward, 2019). We confirm that, excluding the management of açai palm trees, income provided by extractive activity is very low. However, by combining products of agricultural origin and animal husbandry, the increase in income is significant.
In this sense, the diversified production of agroextractivism increases product supply, local potential, knowledge, and farmers' decision-making (Erazo, Silva, & Costa, 2020). Additionally, combinations involving annual crops, perennials, livestock, extractivism, fishing, reforestation, location (upland and lowland), and nonagricultural activities are strategies for strengthening agroextractive activities (Homma, 2021). Livestock can improve production, benefit farmers and environmental impacts; however, care for the combination of pastures with silages needs to be redoubled (Nepstad et al., 2019).
Most inhabitants of RESEXs perform chestnut extraction, vegetable oils, hunting, and fishing. Cassava flour, rice, beans, corn, sweet potatoes, brown sugar, and tobacco are primary agricultural products. Additionally, poultry, pigs, cattle, and buffalo rearing are key in the livestock aspect. We have proven that most producers do not usually associate or combine three productive activities for commercialization, usually specializing in an activity owing to lack of financial resources, opportunity cost of time, affinity, and expressive acceptance in the market.
To reduce these deficits, both the Amazon and sustainable-use CUs need to increase their agricultural productivity to reduce pressure on natural resources and promote domestication of potential plants, replace imports (internal and external) of tropical products (rubber, palm oil, cocoa, rice, milk, poultry, eggs, vegetables, etc.), and provide incentives for recovery of areas that should not have been deforested (Homma, 2020, p. 32). We demonstrate that the combination and productive diversification meet food needs with less environmental damage.
If these possibilities do not enter the agenda of implementation and/or planning and investments, deforestation rates will continue to threaten fauna and flora (Ford et al., 2020;Kröger, 2019). The behavior of local inhabitants proves that the forest will not be intact as socioeconomic needs are indispensable for survival.
In this context, CUs are not effective for the protection of biodiversity and environmental services ( RESEX Chico Mendes is an example of an environmental crisis as it accumulated in one year (2019) of deforestation of 7,900 hectares, the largest in history (INPE, 2022). The Amazon's RESEXs face difficulties in containing advances in deforestation. We found that including technological innovations can increase production, add value to agroextractive products, and reduce impacts of primary and secondary forests.
RESEXs face difficulties in implementing financial and human resources owing to the low priority of actions necessary for economic and socio-environmental development (Souza, Richter, & Costa, 2019). Although rules are important elements of governance in CUs, any study focusing exclusively on rules can cause limitations that affect inhabitant behavior (Ostrom, 2005;Capelari et al., 2020). RESEX heads were instructed to protect and present projects for biodiversity purposes. We understand that the state should come into consensus and include investments in productive activities to ensure consistency between conservation and development.
The Boserupian crisis, such as population growth and low productivity maintenance, is present in RESEXs. As population density increases, soil fertility can no longer be preserved by long allow, which makes the introduction of other systems requiring a much larger agricultural workforce necessary (Boserup, 1987). This context causes the modernization of mechanized equipment, introduction of chemical fertilizers, reduction of production per man-hour, increased food production, valorization of rural skills, and communication at primitive producer levels (Boserup, 1987, p. 141).
Generally, local communities wait for possible partnerships, projects, and institutional programs, of which they are committed to minimal environmental wear and livelihoods. Plant extraction in primary forests, productive activities in secondary forests, and an increase in technological innovations are strategies capable of significantly transforming the reality of RESEXs.

Conclusions
Conducting deforestation and burning to ensure survival in RESEXs for the planting of annual and perennial crops or developing livestock for food production and selling the surplus for the acquisition of extra-property products is necessary. Felling of forests for the establishment of "mowing" and/or pastures is common in RESEXs. Practically, we noticed institutional disinterest in socioeconomic projects and preference for extractive or similar projects that defend the fauna and flora in the forests of RESEXs.
Absence of technological supply and economic and environmental alternatives complicates the improvement of living conditions of inhabitants and the reduction of their impact on natural resources. However, payments for environmental services, carbon credits, and preferences for fauna and flora do not coordinate to achieve sustainability. The proactivity of inhabitants of the RESEXs is important for improving income, developing more sustainable activities, and reducing dependence on direct government transfers.
Here, we conclude that the most suitable strategy is the combination of plant extraction, agriculture, and breeding of large and small animals (adequately) with technological innovations indicated for this model. Integration and diversification increase the socioeconomic conditions of local inhabitants and reduce impacts on natural and environmental resources, if well conducted.
From this perspective, strengthening extractivism (Brazilian nut, extraction of vegetable oils, hunting, and fishing), agriculture (cassava flour, rice, beans, corn, sweet potatoes, brown sugar, and tobacco), and breeding of animals (poultry, pigs, cattle, and buffaloes) will be possible with credit opening, sensitivity of institutional managers, and public-private partnerships. Institutional projects and programs should allow conditions favoring the livelihoods of local inhabitants, as environmental sustainability depends on socioeconomic factors.