LANDSCAPE AND WATER RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

a diagnosis of the Paranapanema River (SP-PR) and Formoso River (MS) Watersheds, Brazil

Abstract

The watersheds of the south, southeast and central-west of Brazil have in agriculture and cattle ranching an important component of landscape alteration and impact on water resources, raising the need to approach them under the systemic prism, fundamental for planning and management. The objective of this article was to use two case studies, the Paranapanema Basin (PR-SP) and the Formoso  Basin (MS) watersheds, to perform a diagnosis of landscape units through landscape cartography with the possibilities of this systemic geographic approach for planning and management of water resources. Both cases were worked in a Geographic Information System  using environmental and geoecological indexes and spatial overlay and crossing. It was pointed out that in both, farming and cattle raising activities are verified and this results, in the Paranapanema Basin, in a considerable territorial portion (61%) with high and very high priority for the intervention of mitigating measures, while in the Formoso Basin about 60% present some kind of depletion and alteration of the landscapes, which exposes a worrying panorama regarding the conservation and preservation of natural resources. These diagnoses allowed us to identify areas that need proposals to minimize environmental problems, improve the quality of water resources and geo-ecological sustainability.