Some Trends and Risks of Pastoral Occupation and Agricultural Consequences for the Romanian Mountain Village – The Results and Conclusions from a Sociological Research in Rucăr Village (Argeş)

Abstract

During the sociological research and in the elaboration of this paper, the authors were challenged by a number of threats to the existence and development of the Romanian mountain village, especially to the pastoral occupations. The major trend and risk are the abandonment of sheep breeding, with negative effects on the local food products and the drastic decrease of the sheep breeding population, which will never be able to provide alternatives to the development of the agriculture by promoting certain agro-tourism activities in Rucăr village. The analysis of the traditional occupational impact requested the application of a sociological research, effected on the field, in order to gain statistic decision support, adjusted to the specific of animals breeding activities and especially to sheep. The most important risk is that traditional sheep breeders tend to become mere historic references and are not replaced by other professions or occupations in rural areas, which seem to disintegrate due to lack of support, to much too high burdens... The final remark underlines that profitability of the sheep breeding occupation was never limited to its specific food products, and covered, instead, sometimes unimaginable , in terms of social and even cultural forms.

Keywords

• pastoral occupation
• sociological research
• sheep breeding
• agro-tourism