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Short Abstract

This study reports a two-year citizen science initiative in Pará, Brazilian Amazon, promoting participatory policies for a sociobioeconomy that integrates sustainability, equity, and biodiversity, fostering intercultural dialogue and ethical research to build a fair and resilient agri-food system.

Abstract

This work presents a two-year citizen science initiative supporting the development of participatory public policies for the sociobioeconomy in the State of Pará—the most populous and extensive territory in the Brazilian Amazon. The region has long suffered from predatory forest exploitation, the expansion of soybean monocultures, soil degradation from livestock, and violence against Indigenous and other traditional peoples.

The sociobioeconomy emerges as a strategic approach to integrate environmental sustainability, social inclusion, economic development, and climate justice within the agri-food system. It promotes diversified production and short supply chains as alternatives to export-oriented monocultures, grounded in the valorization of biodiversity resources, traditional knowledge, and food security. This model strengthens local communities, ensures fair benefit-sharing, and generates decent work and sustainable livelihoods.

The project adopted participatory methods such as consultations, co-design sessions, and field workshops, engaging diverse actors involved in Pará’s sociobioeconomic agenda, particularly Indigenous, quilombola, and other traditional communities. It highlighted both the potential and challenges of citizen science in fostering intercultural dialogue between traditional and scientific-technological knowledge systems. Recognizing different production practices, food cultures, and epistemologies—especially those of minoritized and racialized groups—proved essential to building equitable collaboration. However, these initiatives also face the risk of reproducing extractive dynamics of knowledge and data. Therefore, the development of ethical protocols and safeguards for research is crucial to ensure that citizen science effectively contributes to an agri-food system based on a socio-biodiversity economy that promotes social, environmental, and cognitive justice in the Amazon.