Impasses in the transition towards an ecological basis agriculture: the Coffee Project

Abstract

This project sought to understand how the model of replacing supplies towards an ecology-based agriculture becamea fallacy of ruraldevelopment. We focused on the Lerroville Coffee Project (Projeto Café de Lerroville - PCL) and theshift in its work model in order to analyze how the transition to an ecology-based agriculture is defined by socio-cultural, economic, and political aspects. The inclusion of ACAL (Água de Limeira Coffee Farmers' Association) andAPRALA (Laranja Azeda Water Producers Association) into the fair trade network changed the configuration ofLaranja Azeda and Limeira communities in the rural areas of Lerroville district in the city of Londrina, Brazil. Localrural development strategies were thought by development agents so that the families' production shifted from theconventional methods towards an environmental-friendly management of soil, plants and insects. The theory in thisproject turns to the actor-oriented perspective and the agro-ecological approach in order to find elements tounderstand the transition constitution and process based on supply replacement. The specific goals of the researchare: (i) introducing the North region of Paraná State as well as some of the farmers’daily and cultural practices; (ii)analyzing PCL, the techniques brought about by the transition at hand and highlight directive or participative actionsby the farmers on the change in cultivation system; and (iii) examining the relation among the actors involved, thesteps and the transition pathway toward an organic agriculture. Field observation, on-site experience, structured andsemi structured interviews, and building of both genealogical and land maps make up the methodology set, aimed attesting the following hypothesis: The replacement of supplies in the current organic agriculture model incorporatesthe conventional standards of technology transference, prescribes the transition without linking it to participativemethodologies and fails at allowing farmers’relative autonomy. The market niche for organic products, the socialrepresentations about cultivation systems, the vertical transference of knowledge and the lack of commitment withsocial norms and community habits by the institutions defined the pathway of Lerroville Coffee Project. The analysisof the interviews showed that the economic and political aspects of the transition experience are what shows fromthe transition and also explain the farmers' lack of motivation regarding the transition such as: their interest to theorganic market niche; the conflicting relation among institutions, development agents and farmers. The social andcultural aspects are the backstage of the "failure" of the experience and were brought about during the ethnographicresearch such as: the importance of religious leisure activities to the group's social sustenance; the subtledisagreements between the associations which became a cooperative during the transition and the coffee productionculture as an agent which drives and makes up a history of life and of the region.