Construindo consciência crítica: a educação geográfica e os impactos do Projeto de Integração do Rio São Francisco em Cachoeira dos Índios-PB.

Abstract

The Brazilian Northeast has been going through a historical process marked by a series of policies aimed at the issue of drought. In light of this, there have been several government initiatives aimed at this region, often based on a distorted view of its problems. The São Francisco River Integration Project (PISF) is a mega-development project focused on water infrastructure, and is the largest ever undertaken in Brazil. Launched in 2007, according to the federal government, the project aims to guarantee water security for 390 municipalities and approximately 12 million people in the states of Pernambuco, Ceará, Rio Grande do Norte and Paraíba. However, its main objective is undoubtedly the economic and social development of this region, since the semi-arid climate situation with long periods of drought has prevented the development of large-scale agricultural production activities, with subsistence agriculture prevailing in this region. From this, the PISF presented itself to experts as the best alternative to the problem of poor water distribution in the Northeast region, and was considered essential for solving this problem. However, as the work progresses, the impacts of a mega development project are already beginning to be felt by the local population, not necessarily in a positive way, such as free access to water. The local impacts have in fact been a real chaos in the lives of thousands of families, who have suffered from the expropriation of their lands, through forced displacement, mainly from the many rural communities in the different municipalities, making way for the large infrastructure of the PISF works, such as canals and dams. These families are not given the right to remain on their ancestral lands, historically occupied by their families, where they have shared their territorialities throughout their lives. More than that, they do not explain their rights, nor do they meet the goals set out in the mitigating measures for these impacts, such as compensation or appropriate relocation based on the expression of their territorialities. Therefore, the present research aims to reflect on how Geographic Education can contribute to the critical formation of the population/students in relation to the impacts caused by PISF in the municipality of Cachoeira dos Índios-PB. This municipality has undergone a major transformation as it is one of those included in the canal route, supplied by the Apodi branch that carries water from the Eixo Norte, as well as the construction of the Dam. In this way, we are understanding the school and school geography as an important space to understand the impacts of these works, mainly from the understanding of concepts such as deterritorialization and reterritorialization, processes that are felt firsthand by these families. To this end, we carried out field work in the communities of the municipality most affected by the works of this megaproject, and we developed a lesson plan to be put into practice with an EJA class at the ECI E.E.F.M Professor Adalberto de Sousa Oliveira School. From the development of this class, together with students who went through these deterritorialization processes, we realized the importance of institutions like schools and subjects like Geography in building critical awareness and enabling spaces for discussion about these major impacts.