Abstract
This document presents an analysis of the Zapoco watershed as a socio-ecological system. The area represents a pilot site for the Chiquitano Forest Model within the EcoAdapt research-action project. The first section introduces the analysis, by presenting its context, the issue addressed and the objective of analyzing socio-ecological dynamics. The second section tells how the analysis was led in the Zapoco watershed. It details how several methodological approaches were articulated and how the Open Standards for the Practice of Conservation (OSPC) helped formulating a shared water security issue after identifying threats on the natural resources of the territory. The section on Material and Methods also describes the fieldwork for building PARDI graphs, PARDI standing for Problem-Actors-Resources-Dynamics-Interactions. Those conceptual models allow visualizing practices of land use and water management. The third section of the document presents results. They consist in the formulation of the water security problem that the people of Zapoco watershed consider as a central issue; in the characterization and location of actors and resources that are involved in this joint problem; and in the representation of the main dynamics and interactions that link those actors and resources. Three conceptual models were built: on the agricultural frontier, on water in rural area, and on water in the urban area. The discussion section compares our results on actors with those of a previous actor mapping that had been led in the same landscape. Then it looks at the economic logic at work behind decisions of forest management and of deforestation for livestock expansion. Finally, threats on the natural resources of the territory are made more precise according to the analysis led in socio-ecological terms. We conclude by recapitulating our major findings in this participatory investigation process on socio-ecological dynamics.