Work, Water and Food on the Energy Frontiers: challenges and futures for 21st century technologies in Scotland and Brazil
Funding: Newton Fund
Economic, environmental and climatic uncertainty raises new questions about how access to, and use of, energy, land, water and food is organised. New large scale sources of ‘renewable’ energy such as biomass (agroenergy) plantations and hydrodams are promoted as bringing development, trade and employment opportunities to rural areas.
The research undertaken here in Brazil and Scotland by a group of social and engineering scientists alongside rural communities and organisations present particular social and environmental conflicts arising from new technologies, but also current and potential alternatives for renewable energy and food provision that promise improved relations between those who do the work, their communities and the natural environment.
Research team
- People, Organizations and Society Grenoble School of Management
- Brian Garvey, Work, Employment & Organisation University of Strathclyde
- Institute of Socio-environmental Studies, Federal University of Goiás
- Elsa João, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Strathclyde
- Department of Geography, State University of Goiás
Moncultures, Agrotoxins and Worker Health
This theme explores the increasing incidence of illness and death that correlates with the intensified use of agricultural chemicals in large scale industry; the social, biological and economic implications of monoculture, and the ongoing struggle for alternatives from agrarian, urban and island communities and social movements.
It links the sale of chemicals from Europe (where they are banned) to new health challenges in the Global South, the foreign direct investment strategies of transnational corporations and the subsequent conflicts in new sites of water, (bio)fuel and mineral extraction. The research seeks to make visible existing alternatives that promise enhanced social and environmental futures.
Partners
- Department of Geography University of São Paulo, USP
- Department of Geography State University of São Paulo, Unesp Presidente Prudente (Brazil)
- Department of Geography State University of São Paulo, Unesp Rio Claro (Brazil)
- Seeds of Life A.C (Mexico)
- Department of Economic Production Universidade Metropolitana Autônoma (Mexico)
- Research and Extension, University Eduardo Mondlane, Mozambique
- Department of Geography State University of São Paulo, Unesp
- Department of Political and Social Sciences Free University Berlin (Germany)
- University of Lancaster Environment Centre
- Department of Work, Employment & Organisation, University of Strathclyde
- Milton Santos agrarian reform settlement, Americana, São Paulo
- Departament of Geosciences, Universidade Federal da Paraíba
- Centre of Studies for Geography of Work, UNESP - Universidade Estadual Paulista
- 2 January Agrarian Reform settlement, Descalvado