Changes in patterns of land succession and their implications for the destination of properties among family farmers in the north of Rio Grande do Sul

Abstract

Traditionally, the social reproduction of family agriculture has a close relationship and dependence on the permanence of at least one of the children in the place of the parents, thus materializing the succession process. One of the main characteristics is that the successor son receives the land, or at least part of it, as aninheritance, to produce in it and to assume the responsibility of supporting parents in old age. This study identifies and analyzes the social, economic and productive "arrangements" and strategies that family farmers elaborate and adopt in the absence ofsuccession contexts, especially in relation to the destination of the properties. The data presented in this study provided the basis of the master's thesis defended in 2017 in the Programa de Pós-Graduação em Desenvolvimento Rural (PGDR) of the Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS). This is a case study carried out in the municipality of Frederico Westphalen, in the northern region of the state of Rio Grande do Sul, one of the many regions historically characterized by the large presence of family farmers. Twenty-three family farmers without successors were interviewed in the period from January to April 2016. Currently, for various reasons, families are having difficulties to complete the succession of properties. Thus, the standard and uniform succession model, established in family agriculture and widely studied and disseminated in the specialized literature, seems no longer to prevail, signaling a new kind of succession pattern, although with contours which are not yet clear. The absence ofsuccessors makes the destiny of the properties a key social problem among familiar farmers, causing concern among the parents, but little evident among the children. In general, the results show that there are different paths adopted by farmers regarding the absence of successors, which take into account staying on the property or moving to urban areas, being with their children in the urban environment and being cared for by them or accepting the care of others, which confirms the de-structuring of a pattern of succession that prevailed in previous generations. The study also shows the existence, still under construction, of a new succession pattern among family farmers, now supported by the idea that there would be heirs, but not necessarily successors.