O uso de agrotóxicos: o veneno chegou no oeste catarinense (1970-1980)

Abstract

The debate about the harmfulness of pesticide use is increasingly worrying environmentalists. This is because studying the use of pesticides means assessing the aggressiveness they cause. Thus, the present study aims to analyze the process of occupation of the west of Santa Catarina and the genesis of the use of pesticides, from the 1970s to the 1980s. In this way, it will be approached how it was implemented with the farmers, the Green Revolution, aiming to analyze the discourse changes based on the journals. In the 1970s, there was no concern about impact on the environment and human beings, but a discourse encouraging its use. Leaving later to the 1980s, where there was a view of environmentalists, concerned about the destruction that the use of this chemical causes. The research starts from the historiographical bias of Environmental History, which seeks to analyze the changes and transformations of nature and relationship with human beings, considering the human being as an integral part of the environment in which it is inserted. To have a better understanding of how the emergence of agriculture in the west of Santa Catarina occurred, the research also seeks to contribute to the understanding of the colonization process, which was inserted in the idea of conquering the unexplored areas, seen by the colonizers as new lands and a way to generate boost in the agrarian economy.