Metrology applied to Human Ecology: critical analysis of geospatial data for regionalization of Brazilian Anthromes

Abstract Establishing territorial planning tools that meet the precepts of sustainable development is always challenging. In this sense, anthromes emerge as a differential mechanism. Its structure considers population and environmental parameters, which optimizes the recognition of areas of interest in the territory. However, it is necessary to consider regional aspects, approaching the input data in the cluster analysis. Assuming this, data on population density and land use and cover of National Spatial Data Infrastructure (INDE – Brazil) were analyzed as a source for regionalization. Therefore, an analytical system based on the ISO/IEC 17025 standard was proposed. Globally, this standard is used to guarantee the quality of results through the metrological pillars. Thus, the validation parameters were used to assess the adequacy of the methods to the intended uses and the ability to bring the data closer to the local reality. The tools to guarantee the validity of internal results guided the verification of the quality of treatments performed on the results generated by the methods. The results show that the methods meet their respective scopes, framing the geospatial information investigated in the acceptance profile required for the regionalization of Brazilian anthromes. Furthermore, they bring the information closer to the local reality and characterize important natural features. In this way, the quality of the geospatial data indexed in the INDE to be applied in the cluster analysis was guaranteed. Furthermore, a resource that collaborates in the critical analysis of the results and in the evaluation of environmental and anthropic methods was presented.