Iniciativas de diversificação ao cultivo do tabaco no município de Santa Cruz do Sul – RS: um estudo de caso

Abstract

The following project analyzes the mechanisms by which tobacco producing families use to implement diversification initiatives in Santa Cruz do Sul / RS. Alternatives of diversification of production were verified in the largest tobacco-producing region of the country, and which public policies were involved. An analysis was performed considering negative effects of modernization of agriculture, in particularon peasant agriculture, considering social, economic and environmental aspects. The project was based theoretically on “The Risk Societ” y by Ulrich Beck and “Actor Perspectives” by Norman Long and Jan Douwe van der Ploeg. In this perspective, tobacco growers see the risks caused by tobacco production and seek among their abilities outputs to face these risks. The goal of this study is to know what leads farmers to diversify production on their properties in a tobacco region. What mechanisms are mobilized to promote the diversification? In addition, we seek to identify the motivations and characterize the trajectory of the initiatives employed by peasant families to diversify from tobacco, analyzing which public policies are mobilized in the initiatives and what are their contributions to the promotion of diversification. Besides, we intend to characterize the tobacco production chain, addressing social, environmental and economic aspects in the region of study and point out the actors involved in the initiative, highlighting their role in this process. The methodology used in this project consists in a case of study. There were made 19 interviews with leaders of social movements and tobacco growing families who diversify their production. As results, we found that the diversification initiatives manifest farmers’ self-confrontation from the risks caused by tobacco monoculture based on the Green Revolution. This diversified production tends to strengthen the capacity of farmers to act in response to the risks produced by this production chain and emerge from a perspective where the individual peasant, according to their reality, their way of life, seek to minimize these effects.