O processo de expansão da cana-de-açúcar e seus impactos sobre a qualificação do trabalhador: análise comparativa para os estados de Minas Gerais, Goiás, São Paulo, Paraná e Mato Grosso do Sul

Abstract

Considered the oldest product being produced in Brazil, sugar cane is an essential item among the products supplied by Brazilian Agribusiness. The production of sugar cane has increased lately due to changes in Brazilian and international economic conjuncture which led to new investment in this sector. Nowadays, the production of sugar cane occurs in many states in Brazil. The following must be emphasized: São Paulo, Minas Gerais (mainly in the region of Triângulo Mineiro), south and southwest of Goiás, north of Paraná and northwest of Mato Grosso do Sul. Considering that this production used to be concentrated in São Paulo, the spread of the sugar cane crop throughout many Brazilian states poses the first research question which is why does this spread happen. It is necessary to observe the economic and social changes that follow this spread such as the decrease in the production of traditional crops in these regions, the substitution of certain agricultural activities and the increase in land renting by the sugar cane plants as well as the increase in employment and revenue which led to significant changes in the profile of the workforce employed in this sector. There are three other questions to be answered in this research. Which were the reasons that led to the sugar cane production increase? How the employment is affected by the increasing production? Does the use of new technologies in the sugar cane harvest process affect the employment quality in terms of better qualification of the workforce? In order to answer these questions the following hypotheses are assumed: the qualification of the sugar cane workforce makes the employment quality better and the increase in the sugar cane production goes alongside with a higher level of mechanization in the harvest process which might lead to the end of manual harvesting. To analyze the changes in the productive structure of Minas Gerais caused by the expansion of sugar cane crop is the main goal of this thesis. A database was created using the results found in the Pesquisa Agrícola Municipal (PAM) and the Pesquisa Pecuária Municipal (PPM). Sugar cane, soy and corn crops as well as livestock were the most important items in this research. The results from this new database have shown some important aspects of the traditional crops substitution process. In order to solidify the analysis partial indexes of formality, revenue and education as well as the employment quality index were calculated according to the results from the population censuses of 1991, 2000 and 2010. SPSS syntaxes and routines were used in the data statistical treatment and made possible to calculate the indexes and to elaborate profile tables to characterize the sugar cane workforce. The result of the analysis led to the conclusion that the qualification improvement in the workforce does not improve the employment quality itself due to the low improvement in the revenue index during almost 20 years.