Sustentabilidade de emprendimentos cooperativos agrícolas familiares: um estudo multicasos em Mato Grosso do Su, Brasil e Alicante , Espanha.

Abstract

The present study is an analysis of the sustainability of family farming cooperatives in the State of Mato Grosso do Sul, Brazil and the province of Alicante Spain. The objective of this study was to diagnose the existence of differences in the sustainability of agro-food cooperatives in a developed country and in a developing country. Four dimensions of sustainability, political, economic, social and environmental, were included to carry out the analysis. It was hypothesized that cooperatives, from the more developed country, Spain, would be more sustainable, and the development process reached, for these, examples for cooperatives in the less developed country, in the case studied, Brazil. Sixteen cooperative groups of family farmers were visited in each of the two studied countries, Mato Grosso do Sul, Brazil, and Alicante, Spain. The cooperative groups analyzed were chosen based on those who agreed to make the requested information available. Field research was carried out through the application of a questionnaire, answered by coordinators and administrators of the groups surveyed. The conclusion confirms the hypothesis that cooperatives in Alicante, Spain, would be more sustainable, since they have equity in terms of physical infrastructure, size, revenues, local participation, cooperation between cooperatives, among others, giving greater sustainable intersections in the dimensions Time analyzed. However, cooperatives in Mato Grosso do Sul have shown greater relative efficiency and similar sustainable intersections in the social dimension, since there is strong support from government programs that reduce or cancel costs, such as the National School Feeding Program, PNAE and Acquisition Program Of Food, PAA. The cooperatives of the Brazilian region analyzed are in an organizational process less developed, when compared to the Spanish, but with probability of evolving to the same model of these. The analysis raises questions about the perspectives of cooperativism, since, although Spanish cooperatives generate jobs, income, greater possibilities of participation and care for the environment, they are assuming a commercial organization, thus moving away from the initial motive of the emergence of cooperativism.