Methodological proposal for mapping socio-environmental vulnerability: the case of the municipality of Belém, Pará, Brazil

Abstract

The socio environmental vulnerability brings together a set of environmental and social factors that can decrease or increase the risk (s) in which the human being, individually or in groups, are exposed in the different situations of your life. In this context, this article aims to develop a methodology that makes it possible to map this phenomenon, taking as a case study the city of Belém. Thus, through integrated analysis using geoprocessing tools, the environmental and social vulnerability maps identified the areas with high incidence of socio environmental vulnerability. These places constitute themselves, mostly by illegal occupation of areas of high environmental vulnerability for the population at unfavorable situation regarding per capita income, education, and housing, such as the invasion of mobile dunes and river plains. In this perspective, the mapping of socio environmental vulnerability aims to contribute to the planning of actions that provide sustainable development, supporting, effectively, land use planning process in the city.