Cooperação, reconhecimento e sentido do trabalho no processo de garantia da qualidade orgânica na agricultura familiar

Abstract

Ecological agriculture comprises a sector that has grown sharply in recent decades. With the expansion of this market, there is a demand to guarantee the organic quality of the products, whose processes impact the organization of work and, consequently, the subject-activity relationship. The present research aimed to investigate how participatory models of organic quality assurance intervene in the relationship of the family ecological producer with his activity, in terms of meaning, cooperation and dynamics of work recognition. It was based on the conceptual approaches of Activity Ergonomics, Work Psychodynamics and Activity Clinic, to understand the subject-activity relationship from the experience of the subjects, considering, in addition to the activity performed, the subjective mobilization of the producers in facing real work situations. To conduct the research, an exploratory qualitative methodological approach was used, applied in the study of two cases of family ecological producers in the São Paulo municipalities of Sete Barras and Socorro. As research activities, semi-structured interviews were carried out with 16 producers, observations of real work situations and group validation. The analysis of the results was guided by the content analysis method, based on axes that emerged from the researcher-producers encounter. During the research, informality was identified as a fundamental value of the rural world, which operates as a common thread, influencing both the aspects that mark the specifics of ecological agriculture and the dynamics of guaranteeing organic quality and cooperation. One of the biggest sources of embarrassment arising from organic quality assurance, document control, represents an attack on informality and the word os producers. The relevance of the social in the work of ecological producers is highlighted. Faced with a similar problem in the territories – prescription of conventional standards to ecological producers, through harassment – different social relations lead to different results. In Sete Barras, social contact and families act as mechanisms that prescribe the standards of the conventional. In Socorro, families and social contact operate as barriers to harassment, thus minimizing its potential as prescriber. In Socorro, families are also constituted as a space for the recognition and conformation of the meaning of work. As for the values that make up the meaning of work for ecological producers, a sense of collective belonging, a harmonious bond with nature, autonomy and freedom stood out. The sense of collective belonging is shown to be linked to the dynamics of participatory guarantee, indicating that its living instances collaborate for the development of this value among ecological producers.