A conservação da fauna através da tecnologia: cartilha didática como ferramenta de educação ambiental no Parque Nacional do Iguaçu

Abstract

The Atlantic Forest Biome has the greatest biodiversity in the world, with more than 893 species of birds and 250 species of mammals, besides high rates of endemism. However, due to human exploitation of its forested areas, the Biome has been reduced to 8% of its original territorial extension and many species are at risk of extinction, making Conservation Units (CUs) indispensable agents in the preservation of this enormous and beautiful biodiversity. In Brazil, the Iguaçu National Park (PNI), located in 14 municipalities of the State of Paraná, is the largest CU in the South of the country, essential not only for the preservation of several species of birds and mammals, but also as a space for research, maintenance of abiotic factors, ecotourism and development of environmental actions of educational nature. Therefore, this work aimed to develop the prototype of a mobile application in the form of a descriptive booklet, with ecological information and curiosities of the main species of birds and mammals present in the unit, focused on Environmental Education (EE), in order to sensitize tourists, the local community and students of basic education about the importance of avian and mammalian fauna for ecosystems. For this, a systematic literature review was carried out for the ecological characterization, through the analysis of chapters of books on animal anatomy and physiology, documents from the Ministry of Environment and ICMBio, scientific articles and information from internal research made available by the institution itself. For the ecological characterization of the species, 31 mammal species and 5 bird species from PNI were used. From this, it was found that of the 31 mammal species described, 10 are Vulnerable (VU), 18 Least Concern (LC), 1 Near Threatened (NT) and 2 (two) with Insufficient Data (DD), while of the 5 species described, 3 of these have some kind of threat even in the UC, and 2 (two) are in a state of low concern for extinction, according to the classification of the Red List of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). In view of the above, the importance of the UC for the conservation of fauna is undeniable, since these organisms are important for all social spheres and for life as a whole, especially the PNI, which acts as a true hero of the Atlantic Forest, not only in an environmental bias, but in multiple, social spheres, promoting well-being, connection with nature, quality of life, availability and wealth in food and water resources, in addition to acting in conjunction with the EE, thus strengthening the individual and collective awakening to the care of natural resources and their indispensable importance for the survival and establishment of life on Earth. Moreover, it is hoped that this work will foster new research on scientific dissemination and technology, in order to integrate the broad literature review used with the growing technological advances, ensuring that this vast knowledge is not restricted only to the doors of the academic world.