Logic of Commodities and Coffee Growing: The production of specialty coffees with Geographical Indication in the Mantiqueira de Minas Region

• Grant number: 23/06019-7
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Master
• Effective date (Start): December 01, 2024
• Effective date (End): October 31, 2025
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Geography - Regional Geography
• Principal Investigator: Samuel Frederico
• Grantee: Anna Paula Ferreira Galego
• Host Institution: Instituto de Geociências e Ciências Exatas (IGCE). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Rio Claro. Rio Claro , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The expansion of competitiveness caused by the advance of neoliberalism and the opening of the world market at the end of the 20th century, linked to new values associated with consumption, led to the production of differentiated coffees that are distinguishable from commodity or common coffee. One of these initiatives aimed at adding greater value to the product and giving greater identity to producers and production regions by associations and producers was the creation of Geographical Indications. This research aims to analyze the production of specialty coffee with Geographical Indication in the Mantiqueira de Minas Region. The aim is to analyze whether the production of specialty coffees with Geographical Indication promotes greater identity and productive autonomy, or if, in a contradictory way, it has undergone processes of recommoditization, with its appropriation by large corporations in the sector. To this end, a survey of primary data will be carried out with field work in Carmo de Minas (MG) and a survey of secondary data on the production of specialty and commodity coffees. We hope, therefore, to understand whether the production of coffee with Geographical Indication confers greater autonomy and identity to places and producers, when compared to commodity coffee and how it behaves in relation to the logic of commodities, promoting processes of decommoditization or recommoditization.