Os saltos do “canguru” nos canaviais alagoanos. Um estudo sobre trabalho e saúde
Abstract
This thesis aims to study the working conditions in the sugarcane agribusiness in Alagoas
and its effects on workers' health. The issue studied was the analysis of working
conditions and health in the face the current situation of sugarcane agribusiness in
Alagoas: characterized by productive restructuring and the intensification of work in
manual cutting of sugarcane. The increased effort required in this labor activity produces
besides the physical, moral and psychological distress. . This thesis is justified to the
extent that it aims to complete at least two gaps with regard to health approach to rural
workers: the absence of research focusing on the physical health of workers articulated
the moral and psychological distress; and the absence of studies on the cane fields of
Alagoas that communicate substantially with the research undertaken in the cane fields
of Sao Paulo. The main objective of this research was to contribute to the reflections on
the causal connection between illness and the cane cutting job. To achieve this scope,
field research and interviews were carried out with cane cutters, mill former residents,
unemployed because of illness, cable (surpervisor), plant manager, medical, among other
key informants; furthermore it was performed exercise testing, monitoring heart rate
during labor, application Nordic Musculoskeletal Questionnaire and physical evaluation
- procedures performed with the collaboration of doctors and fitness trainers -. The
interviews were conducted by the methodology of oral history. The municipality of
Teotonio Vilela was the privileged empirical universe by concentrating a large number
of workers employed in various plants in the south of Alagoas. The data collected indicate
existence of direct relationship between work in the cane fields and the early exhaustion
of physical and spiritual energies of workers.