The commercialization channels used by family farmers in Aratiba – RS

Abstract

This work aims to identify the commercialization channels used by orange, milk and swine producers in the municipality of Aratiba - RS, in addition to highlighting the degree of diversity of the commercialization channels used by family farmers to offer agrifood production. This research is classified as exploratory and descriptive, and its data were collected between January and April 2020, through semi-structured interviews with 50 orange, milk and swine producers residing in the municipality of Aratiba - RS. The research results made it possible to identify the different commercialization channels used by the surveyed producers and also to verify that 86% of rural properties use only one commercialization channel to offer agrifood products, 12% of family production units use two or three channels (channels of diversified commercialization) to commercialize agrifood production and only 2% of agricultural establishments use more than three channels (super-diversified commercialization channels) to offer agrifood products. The contributions of this study reinforce the evidence on the agency capacity of family producers to create conditions to guarantee the socioeconomic reproduction of family groups and on the existence of sales spaces that allow social actors to build autonomous and transparent commercial relationships.