This paper seeks to describe the situation of rural settlements in 2006 in relation to productivity, settlers' educational attainment, income composition, and agricultural technology, among other things. The data presented encompass five geographical regions as well as Brazil as a whole, and compare settlement data with the total of agricultural settlements and also with the family farming. The Agricultural Census (IBGE, 2006) reported for the first time information about the agricultural...

The paper investigates the agribusiness development in Brazil as well as its agrarian structure, highlighting the lack of implementation of agrarian reform, since the Empire age period until the 1960s, and moreover, using agricultural census data of 1960, 1970, and 1985, as main indicators, also evaluates the impact of measures taken by concentrationist regimes during the military government. Recent initiatives to encourage family farming are emphasized and, using 2006 agricultural census...

This article seeks to demystify, through deconstruction, the concept that currently in Brazil there are no agrarian policies in force. With this purpose, it is outlined a series of policies that were created in the last fifteen years, which have offered support to complement the policy framework, that was lacking in the 80's. It was introduced PRONAF, the Land Credits, the PAA, and the ATER law, recently passed. The article also presents a polemical view of models of social and productive...

The purpose of this paper is to provide a provisional assessment of the settlement experience of rural settlements established during the last 25 years in two different regions of São Paulo (Brazil). As a consequence of the movement that encompasses a broad spectrum of issues which includes redemocratization of the country, the articulation of new political forces (trade unions and rural social movements) and institutional boundaries defined by the Federal Constitution in 1988, and the...

This article aims to examine the Food Acquisition Program (PAA) and its significant contribution to family agriculture, food security, and nutrition. Various approaches to studying PAA have been set forth in an attempt to systematize the existing literature (reviews and analyses of the Program) and this study has shown main factors that have contributed to the changes in production and consumption patterns of either the families farming or their beneficiaries; the impacts on agricultural...

The meanings attributed to the term "public policies" encompass areas of social action embedded within the broad framework in academic legitimacy and are also in line with prevailing political thought or policy, on purpose to produce the desired outcomes. In this article, I deliberately focus  on the meanings that come from actions aimed at developing strategies for formulating goals, defining criteria, etc., according to the common sense meanings. The meaning of the term "public policy" is...

The Ribeirão Preto region, in the state of São Paulo, Brazil, is characterized by the predominance of monoculture of sugarcane, which shows great potential for negative environmental impact on the Guarani Aquifer. Aiming to meet the social demand for land and to promote integrated policies and practices that encourage the environmental protection, in 2004 a land reform settlement was established in that region - the Sepé Tiraju agroecological settlement, based on the principles of...

The issue of rural development has been discussed by different agencies and agents, whether governmental or otherwise, that direct their discussions towards convergence among agricultural, agrarian, and environmental issues. Within this approach, conservation and restoration of natural resources, and the agricultural production are all equally important. In Brazil, this perspective has placed land reform settlements as important alternatives avenues for the implementation of agricultural...

AThe trajectory of agricultural modernization and the implementation process in rural regions in Brazil through different forms of expropriation and expulsion of many agricultural workers, who, as consequence, have lost their homes and their livelihoods, depicts these people, at every moment, as common people. They are defined through their rural identities, but there is also evidence of disruption due to the migration to urban areas, subject to the conditions imposed by a pre-existing...

This article aims to provide an overview of the challenges faced by settled workers in the Horto Bueno de Andrada, in Araraquara town, São Paulo state, regarding the integration processes to work in partnership with the agricultural industries of the sugarcane ethanol sector in that region. We initially dealt with the issue of authorization to the cultivation of sugar cane – described by many settlers, members of the management board, and the mills as a "partnership", which would represent...