ANALYSIS The role of women in the mangrove crab (Ucides cordatus, Ocypodidae) production process in North Brazil (Amazon region, Pará) André Magalhães a , Rauquírio Marinho da Costa a, * , Rossivaldo da Silva a , Luci Cajueiro Carneiro Pereira b a Laboratório de Plâncton e Cultivo de Microalgas, Universidade Federal do Pará, Campus Universitário de Bragança. Alameda Leandro Ribeiro s/n, Aldeia, Bragança, Pará, Brazil b Laboratório de Oceanografia Costeira e Estuarina, Universidade Federal do Pará, Campus Universitário de Bragança. Alameda Leandro Ribeiro s/n, Aldeia, Bragança, Pará, Brazil. CEP: 68600-000 ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT Article history: Received 19 February 2005 Received in revised form 5 May 2006 Accepted 26 May 2006 Available online 24 July 2006 The mangrove crab Ucides cordatus is considered by some authors as the keystone species in the mangrove ecosystem of the Caeté river estuary, North Brazil. In this region, crab fishery constitutes the main source of income for native households, and crab collectors are almost all men. The present study was carried out to characterize the role of women in the mangrove crab production process in the district of Caratateua (Pará, Brazil). Crabmeat processing and other activities, such as the construction of traps and other crab gathering artifacts used by the men in crab collection, clearly place the women in the crab production process. © 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Keywords: Amazon region Ucides cordatus Crab pickers Crabmeat Women 1. Introduction Mangroves are coastal ecosystems situated in tropical and subtropical zones, in which an intrinsic and complex pool of ecological and socioeconomic aspects is determinant to the implementation of management planning. The mangroves biological importance undoubtedly resides in the fact that a lot of plant, invertebrate (crustacean, molluscan and others) and some vertebrate species use these ecosystems as breeding and living areas during their entire life cycles or during specific stages of their development (Hatcher et al., 1989; Robertson et al., 1992; Twilley et al., 1996). The fauna and flora of the mangrove constitute an intricate food web that is essential to the health of coastal ecosystems, as well as to oceans and adjacent seas (Schaeffer-Novelli, 1995). On the other hand, these ecosystems are the niche chosen by a great number of fishermen to obtain products that are essential to their subsistence (Odum and Heald, 1972). In mangrove areas, the main element that defines the sur- vival of local communities is the familial work directed to the production units. In the Amazon littoral some familial works are carried out by local communities that use mangrove natural ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS 61 (2007) 559 – 565 ⁎ Corresponding author. Tel.: +55 91 34254536; fax: +55 91 34251745. E-mail address: raucosta@ufpa.br (R.M. da Costa). 0921-8009/$ - see front matter © 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.ecolecon.2006.05.013 available at www.sciencedirect.com www.elsevier.com/locate/ecolecon