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 *by Jaques Pena
Over the past 10 years, Brazil has been presenting itself as a country that gets involved in global issues, expressing interest in providing support to countries facing social/environmental problems. The step is usually taken with the offer of solutions that were applied here and have had positive results in the addressing of barriers to development, such as social inequality, access to quality education and job opportunities.
Progress in Brazil has been due to an interesting and worthwhile observing phenomenon - a series of initiatives taken by the communities themselves and sometimes with the technical know-how from universities or other centres of research, to benefit small groups of families, but that have expanded and improved the living conditions of hundreds of people and reinforced public policies.
These projects have become increasingly more comprehensive and complex, on account of their need to organize themselves so as to be able to take on the great number of social ills. The projects have evolved a different dynamic called “Social Technology”, which considers products, techniques or methodologies to be developed in the interaction with the community, present effective solutions for social transformation and can be reapplied to scale.
As an example of this evolution of social technologies, we can point to the Bank of Social Technologies (BTS), available on the Internet, which was thought up and is being maintained by the Fundação Banco do Brasil. It brings together over 500 social technologies from various sources and categories and serves as a centre for disseminating practical solutions, easily reapplicable to the whole society.
These technologies are easy to use and cost little, which make them effective in situations of extreme poverty or those affected by environmental imbalances. The recent tragedy in Haiti has rekindled the debate about how Brazil can help rebuild that country and that the social technologies have proved to be the most appropriate way. Social Technologies like Integrated and Sustainable Agroecology Development (Pais) - reapplied in more than 6,000 units, in 19 states, by the Fundação Banco do Brasil in conjunction with various partners such as BNDES, Petrobras, SEBRAE and governments – arise within this same context, presenting food security alternatives in a country that suffers from lack of food.
The Pais promotes a system of organic production of vegetables, fruit and small animals, taking for granted the rationalization of resources and the ecological management of land. All production takes place without the use of pesticides, providing healthy food, free of any chemical interference. Irrigation is done through a drip system, which avoids wasting water and makes it possible to set up the model even in areas with low water reserves, as is the case of Haiti.
Mozambique and El Salvador have also expressed interest in getting to know the Brazilian social technologies. They want to know what their communities have been doing to change their realities. The Fundação Banco do Brasil makes its encouragement to these technologies its contribution to the development of our country and believes that the technologies can indeed bring about the social transformation of thousands of people.
* President of the Fundação Banco do Brasil
Source: REBIA Website
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