Amêndoa de cacau de alta qualidade na Transamazônica: as práticas dos agricultores familiares em função das exigências do mercado

Abstract

This study seeks to analyze the changes occurred in the practices for producing cocoa nuts by organic cooperated families according to market requirements and high quality in the Transamazônia region. In field research, there were conducted interviews to 47 organic cooperated families from the cities of Pacajá, Brasil Novo and Medicilândia, taken as illustrative of the regional reality of biophysical properties and cocoa's production practices. Initially it was made the characterization of the recent practices used by the families, correlating them to benefits obtained (Production of High Quality Cocoa Nuts´- ACOAQ), construction of infrastructure for fermentation-“coxo”, construction of stove or noncover stove-“barcaça”, production and utilization of organic inputs) and the limiting difficulties to carry out the activities, according to the recommendations of the organic cooperatives. For the study of the variations in the practices, there were conducted semi-structured interviews for a sample of 11 families; the information taken was used to identify the evolutionary trajectories of the agricultural establishments, with emphasis in the cocoa subsystems and its practices. It was corroborate in this stage of the research the presence of 4 different groups of evolutionary trajectories, classified by the characteristics of the practices used in the cocoa systems: (i) the ones with stable production of ACOAQ; (ii) the unstable in the production of ACOAQ; (iii) the ones which are passing through difficulties in the production of ACOAQ; and (iv) the ones who need some adjustments to produce ACOAQ. The research concludes that the organic markets and the practices to obtain high quality cocoa nuts influence the cooperated families in different ways; these families could: a) improve their production and attend the market with the production of ACOAQ and maintain the fertility of the plantation; b) limit the production of the ACOAQ, because of reduced workforce for the activities and prioritizes the ACC (Conventional Cocoa Nut) production; c) rebalances the systems by excluding the ACOAQ production, and substituting for ACC production because of lack of working capital for immediate payment of produced cocoa nuts; d) does not attend these markets because they seek to avoid imbalance between the subsystems by excluding chemical inputs, or changing the cocoa subsystem by using chemical fertilizers because of productivity or poor workforce, or because they are recently organic cooperators that exclude chemical inputs.