Cleaner Production divulging and incentive actions developed by Paranapanema Rural Union (Sindicato Rural de Paranapanema) - SINDIPAR

Paranapanema Rural Union – SINDIPAR participates of São Paulo Cleaner Production Roundtable since 2002, divulging and fostering the adoption of technologies, which minimize or avoid waste generation, according UNEP´s Cleaner Production principles.

As a representative of rural producers, SINDIPAR focus its actions on the need of sustainability on production processe s, defending the most legitimate interest of agriculture and cattle producers, as the right of property and the man fixation on land, through the raise of productivity and effi cient management of resources.

According SINDIPAR Directory Board, farmers have a strong natural vocation to environmental preservation. D ue to their daily observation, farmers have the capability of interpret ecosystems cleverly. The u nderstanding of this capability is the fundamental condition for institutions compromised with environmental preservation and restoration for getting farmers as great allies . This conviction led SINDIPAR Director Board to act in an integrated manner with institutions as Paranapanema Touristic Municipality , fostering environmental preservation of the region.

With a highly diverse agriculture, cultivation of different cereals, cotton, fruits, flowers and cattle, and forestry, many Paranapanema's farmers are adopting different cleaner production technologies, as:

1) The adoption of "direct cultivation on straw", which rationalizes the use of herbicides and almost eliminates soil erosion - this technique has been used for more than 20 years on the region, and actually prevail on most of the farms.

2) The control of insects, fungus and acarus population through plague monitoring and the use of biological control developed at Paranapanema, which eliminates the unnecessary use of defensives, reducing waste discharges on the local environment.

3) The plague control through "sexual confusion " (the use pheromones to difficult mating between males and females). Local farmers, without any incentive, are taking this cleaner initiative much more expensive than conventional ones.

4) Farms dedicated to the cultivation of fruits and flowers, adopted " good agriculture practices " imposed by the necessity of exportation and the results on environmental and social quality can be noticed clearly on the municipality.

5) The use of resources funded by SENAR-AR SP, and the representative power of FAESP on the defense of farmers' interest, enable rural properties to produce in a cleaner way, through professional formation and environmental awareness of rural working force . As an example, one can cite the reduction of losses on peaches harvest, which initially summed up 23% and fell to 3% after training offered by SINDIPAR, USP, ESALQ, CEAGESP, HOLANTEC, Faz. Capuava, FAESP and SENAR.

6) Through a partnership involving SINDIPAR, ASPIPP and SOS Mata Atlântica, from 2002 to 2005, half a million native trees were planted on the surroundings of Paranapanema water bodies , and additional 500 thousand cuttings of native trees (as cabreuvas, perobas, angicos, guapuruvus, aroeiras, leiteiros, cambaras, guarucaias, taiuvas, ingas, native guava, jacares, ipes, araçás between others) will be planted until the end of this decade.

Finally, the Directory Board of SINDIPAR emphasizes that we still have a hard job to transform the actual ways of production and spread the adoption of cleaner production on productive processes. These will be the challenges of SINDIPAR on agriculture - to include, qualify, transform and rebuilt production processes.