Vidas despedaçadas impactos socioambientais da construção da usina hidrelétrica de Balbina (AM), Amazônia Central

Abstract

Sustainable development is a global necessity. Regarding the Amazon, there is much to discuss and improve the scope of projects for large hydroelectric plants, built for a generating energy, but because involve forced displacement of populations due to the dams of the rivers, often have large social conflicts created as occurred historically, from projects and military government agencies, in the 1960, 1970 and 1980 in Brazil. One of Amazonian dams that showed great potential for the generation of these conflicts was Balbina. Located in Presidente Figueiredo, in the Central Amazon, the Balbina dam had completed its construction in 1987, flooding an area of 2.400 km2 of forest, reaching about 3.000 families living downstream of the dam. The objective of this study is to analyze social impacts after nearly 25 years of operation of the dam began in 1989. The impacts were analyzed based on: i) participant observation, in which the social context is described, and ii) study and inferential analysis of lifestyles, through analytic ethnography. At around Balbina were interpreted results indicating disaffiliation territorial biases and emotional, fragmentation of belonging, weakening of social relations and demotion of practical actions for the formation of organized groups in the region. How coping and mitigating actions, we chose to highlight: i) suspension and cancellation, immediately, via action by Public Ministry and Procon, of all debts pertaining to electricity bills that have been imputed to those affected by dams, ii ) reorganization of the economy within the living environments to address food insecurity and lack of income, iii) implementation of a model of trade with use aggregate of social currency to those affected by the dam and iv) the orientation of production according to the population diversity upstream and downstream of the dam.