Agricultural development in Esmeraldas-Ecuador: Study from land use

Abstract

To provide information, the characterization of the land use in the agricultural development of the San Mateo parish was carried out. The scope of the investigation corresponded to the Canchalagua and Nuevo Tabete precincts of the San Mateo parish adhering to the linking project of the Luis Vargas Torres de Esmeraldas Technical University called: Strengthening the local capacities of the agricultural sector of five rural parishes of the Canton Emeralds. For the study, 33 surveys were used, where 19 surveys were applied in the Canchalagua campus and 14 in Nuevo Tabete that to date culminated with the first stage framed in the project. For the gathering of field information, the following classes were determined for the use of the soil in the enclosures: Agriculture, Livestock, Forestry and Agroforestry. For the tabulation of the data, an Excel template was used that made it possible to establish graphs and tables of the surveys carried out. The results in land use show that, of the total of those surveyed in Canchalagua, 70.97% of the land is dedicated to agriculture, highlighting the production of cocoa and bananas, while 15% is destined to pastures and 13 , 72% of the producers are dedicated to forestry. In the Nuevo Tabete enclosure of the total of the surveyed producers, it reflected that most of the land is used for agriculture with 53.38%, highlighting the production of banana and corn, 27.07% is dedicated to livestock, the 12.03% in agroforestry and finally 7.52% corresponded to soils dedicated to forestry. In the areas studied, a large part of the members of the associations are small smallholder producers who have a few hectares dedicated to the sowing and harvesting of cocoa and bananas, mainly.