Sustainability Indicators for Dairy Farming in Farms in Northern Ecuador

This project addresses the critical limitation in smallholder dairy farming in Ecuador, characterized by the absence or unreliability of records, which hinders the evaluation of the economic, productive, and environmental impact of technological practices. The main objective is to develop a methodology tailored to national realities to identify and measure economic, social, and environmental sustainability indicators within Dairy Production Systems (DPS). The solution involves creating a technical support IT system for data recording, initially supplemented by physical records. Producers will be trained in system management, aiming to utilize existing technological infrastructure, such as community Infocenters. The methodology will be based on the MESMIS model, evaluating attributes like productivity, equity, stability, adaptability, and self-confidence through monthly and semi-annual measurements of milk, soil, and water over a two-year period across stratified farms. The project seeks to generate participatory conclusions and recommendations, systematize producers' experience in data management, and disseminate results through scientific publications and stakeholder workshops.<br/><br/><b>Goal</b>: <br/>To establish economic, social, and environmental sustainability indicators for dairy farming activities by creating a baseline that allows for permanent temporal analysis of Dairy Production Systems (DPS) within a specific dairy basin in Ecuador.<br/><br/><b>Research lines</b>: <br/>Social and environmental interrelationships of dairy activity