Resumo

TORRES LIMA, Pablo; RODRIGUEZ SANCHEZ, Luis  e  SANCHEZ JERONIMO, Óscar. Evaluación de la sustentabilidad del desarrollo regional: El marco de la agricultura. Región y sociedad [online]. 2004, vol.16, n.29, pp.109-144. ISSN 2448-4849.

Sustainability of regional development can be evaluated using a number of methodologies. Methodological itineraries to study the role played by agriculture in regional sustainable development provide important facts for the analysis, such as the hierarchical re l ationships among production systems within the framework of various space and time levels. This paper examines the main methodological approaches and indicators used for evaluating sustainability, and offers a proposal for studying the regional development based sustainability and in the context of agricultural systems. This includes: 1) evaluating general development tendencies concerning economy, environment and sustainability; 2) establishing the profile of regional evaluation for agricultural activities based on socioeconomic and agroecological indicators, and 3) studying the development and economic strategies of family units, their quality of life and local environment. Formulating qualitative and quantitative indicators of sustainability is a fundamental stage of the research process on regional development mainly according to four criteria: economic, social, political-institutional and environmental.

Palavras-chave : sustainability; regional development; agricultural systems.