Between 1 and 7 February, the LIFE Maronesa project, through its project manager, took part for the second year in a row in the Alto Minho Traditional Fire Training Exchange TREX, organised by various regional entities such as the CIM of Alto Minho, the Municipality of Paredes de Coura and the European Prescribed Fire Association – Nodfyr Portugal, with the support of The Nature Conservancy, the international organisation that founded this initiative.
TREX is a practical activity that promotes diversity in the nature of the participants, bringing together professionals from various areas linked to the use or management of fire (technical or suppression) but also other scientific, social and even artistic-cultural areas linked to the use of fire by traditional and rural communities.
The activities are focused on the traditional use of fire as an ecological tool for managing ecosystems, valuing the ancestral knowledge acquired in the past by rural communities around the world. The event was attended by various nationalities from countries such as Colombia, France and Germany, with special guest João Morita, Coordinator of ICMBio’s Specialised Centre for Integrated Fire Management in Brazil.
The 6th day was dedicated to theoretical presentations. In the morning, participants had the opportunity to learn about the LIFE Maronesa project. In addition to the monitoring works and prescribed fire operations, the project manager emphasised the relationship and proximity to livestock farmers and shepherds, as well as the importance, from a complementary food and nutritional perspective, of the relationship between fire and domestic and wild herbivores and other animals such as birds, reptiles and insects that also take advantage of this window of opportunity created by fire. In the afternoon, we had the pleasure of attending and participating in the ‘Use of Fire and Pyric Pastoralism’ workshop, organised by the Green Gap cross-border project.
