Reduction in the number of sugar-cane rural workers not specialized in São Paulo: situation in cities of sugar-cane and politics adopted

• Grant number: 10/50087-7
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Start date: June 01, 2010
• End date: May 31, 2012
• Field of knowledge: Applied Social Sciences - Economics - Agrarian and Natural Resource Economics
• Principal Investigator: José Giacomo Baccarin
• Grantee: José Giacomo Baccarin
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Ciências Agrárias e Veterinárias (FCAV). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Jaboticabal. Jaboticabal , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Sao Paulo state is the main producer of sugar-cane, alcohol and sugar in Brazil. In recent years, has been observed great growth in sugarcane production, with substantial technological changes, especially in agricultural activities. Since 2006, the replacing process of the manual harvesting of burnt cane by mechanical harvesting of cane without burning has been accentuated, facing of the fact the increased market demands in terms of environmental caie. This, along with modifications in the planting of sugar cane has resulted in reducing the number of unskilled sugar cane workers in Sao Paulo, which went from 212,966 people in June 2007 to 182,735 people in June 2009. This fact tends to reflect differently in the sugar cane municipalities, according to the importance of sugarcane occupation in the total of local occupation. One of the goals is to perform surveys for each of the sugar cane cities of São Paulo, changes between 2006 and 2010, the number of sugarcane workers unskilled compared to the total sugarcane occupation and the occupation of the city, also addressing the seasonality of employment and some social characteristics. The other goal is to evaluate, in 25 municipalities, the actions of government in confronting the reduction in jobs of sugarcane, particularly in programs for replacement, rehabilitation and referral to insurance against unemployment. For the first objective will use information of the Dissemination Program of Labor Statistics of the Ministry of Labor and Employment. The second objective will include the application of questionnaires to those responsible for employment policies in selected municipalities. (AU)