Potential of the sustainability of livestock agroecosystems in the Ecuadorian Amazon region

Abstract

Sustainable management of livestock systems is strongly influenced by environmental, social,
economic and political indicators that can vary at different scales and localities and allow to
simplify, quantify and analyze sustainability in a holistic way. The objective of this study was
to evaluate sustainability through indicators in different livestock agroecosystems located in
10 de Agosto, Pastaza province, Ecuador. The sustainability potential was evaluated at the
agroecosystem level in 52 production units applying a methodology based on a scoring system
that included environmental, socio-cultural, economic and political indicators. Three sustainability
classes were obtained with significant differences (P≤0.05) in the potential sustainability
index (PSI) and environmental (ED), socio-cultural (SCD), economic (ED) and political (PD).
The average per dimension showed the following sequence: for class III 7,75ED> 7,36SCD>
6,85ED> 6,50DP, class II 6,93ED> 6,49SCD> 6,04ED> 4,76PD and for class I 5.81 ED> 5.20
ED>4.37SCD>2.63 PD. These results affected the average value of the IPS that showed differences
according to each class, showing the following order: 7,12a AS> 6,05b MS> 4,50c BS.
The results suggest that sustainability at the level of agroecosystems presents critical levels in
each dimension, being the economic and political the most limiting for the lower class