DAAD project “EcoCer” (Brazil)

With the aim of promoting cooperative research activities of German universities in cooperation with international partners, the DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service) supports joint research projects through the PPP-program („Project-related student and staff exchange”).

The „EcoCer“ project, led by Professor Dr. Dietrich Darr (Faculty of Life Sciences), is conducted in collaboration with the project partners Universidade Federal de Viçosa (Brazil), Universidade de Brasília (Brazil), the research institute Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuária (Brazil) and the Albert-Ludwigs-University in Freiburg (Germany). The overall objective is an analysis of ecosystem services and socioeconomic performance of silvopastoral systems in the Brazilian Cerrado.

The Cerrado region is a major centre of agricultural production in Brazil. Large commercial farms produce most of the agricultural products in this area, with a smaller portion produced by smallholder farmers. Due to the intensive commercial monocultures, the Cerrado faces significant sustainability challenges such as deforestation.

Tradionally, agriculture in the Cerrado consisted of indigenous silvopastoral systems, where cattle were kept on pastures planted with native tree species. However, these systems are less productive and profitable and are therefore at risk of conversion into more intensive production systems, even though they have environmental benefits. The proposed project aims to increase the productivity and profitability of these silvopastoral systems and also to improve the more intensive agricultural pro-duction systems by analysing the geographic distribution, ecological and social benefits and the adoption of these systems in the Cerrado.

Through the proposed joint research and academic exchange programs, the project will contribute to the following project objectives: (a) building a network of researchers between the participating Brazil-ian and German instituions, (b) build the careers of junior scientists by offering them international research experience, (c) produce joint research results and publications addressing the above re-search problems.

The project offers international research experience for four German and four Brazilian PhD students, one German and two Brazilian post-docs, and five German and 13 Brazilian senior scientists from the participating institutions.

Contact

Prof. Dr. Dietrich Darr



Dietrich.Darr@hochschule-rhein-waal.de

Tel.: +49 (0)2821/80673245