With the country's largest population growth rate, the Brazilian Amazon is also the area with the biggest potential for environmental degradation and biodiversity loss, due to the occupation and disorderly use of space and its resources.
Among the relevant economic activities, fishery represents an important income source to the local communities, as well as being one of the main food source which is high in protein, to those populations.
Fishery and Aquatic Ecology Graduate Program (PPGEAP – Portuguese acronym) - Master and Doctoral Degree - focus on the problems related to the preservation and Amazon Aquatic Ecosystem management, due to the use of its natural resources by the people, fisheries resources in particular, for economic and regional development activities.
The main objective is to empower human resources able to understand, in an integrated way, the complex dynamics of the Amazon Aquatic Ecosystem, aiming at the reasonable use of its resources and its preservation.
PPGEAP concentration area is referred to Aquatic Ecology and Fishery Resources in the
Amazon, formed by three research lines: Aquatic Biodiversity; Conservation and Social-environmental Impact on Aquatic Ecosystems; and Ecology and Fishery Resources Management.
The academic staff is formed by 23 researchers, among them professors from UFPA and invited professors from other institutions, including foreign ones, with multidisciplinary qualification.
The program was signed by CAPES with grade level 4in 2007. There are around 27 Master's degree students and 29 Doctor's degree students. (Date updated in October 2016).