Rural employees by sugarcane companies in the State of Sao Paulo: recent evolution

Abstract

From December 2008 to December 2009 it was made the accompaniment of the number of people formally employed by sugarcane companies in the State of Sao Paulo, Brazil. It has resulted in nine editions of a newsletter that has been distributed electronically to employers and workers organizations, companies of the sector, researchers, social organizations and agencies of the government with politics related to the topic. This paper abridges the main findings of the newsletters. The aim of this is to analyze the consequences of the recent process of expansion of sugarcane, which was followed by the intensification of agricultural mechanization, on the number and on the seasonal employment of rural workers employed in plantations of Sao Paulo, relative to the total of persons employed in this sector. It intends to make a contribution so that the social agents involved on this have more precise information about recent changes in the labor market of the sugarcane workers, also, it wants to cooperate so that public politics linked with these changes can be formulated. Since the mid-1990 changes in planting and harvesting of sugarcane have been seen. In this case the manual harvesting of burnt cane has been replaced by mechanical harvesting of sugarcane, a fact that has gained more intensity since 2006, when the sugar cane businessman, aiming to increase exportation, decided to reinforce the image of ethanol as a renewable and relatively non-polluting fuel. They used data from the Dissemination of Labor Statistics of the Ministry of Labor of Federal Government of Brazil, which record information about formal employment provided by the companies themselves, through the Annual Relation of Social Information (RAIS), with data for December 31, and the General Register of Employed and Unemployed (CAGED), which brings the monthly turnover of employees. It was analyzed, for the period of 2006 to 2009, the evolution of employment in companies of the following groups: Cultivation of Sugarcane, Production of Raw Sugar, Production of Refines Sugar and Production of Alcohol. Also has been analyzed the development in the following categories of persons employed: Workers in Agriculture, Industry Workers (Distilleries), Administrative and Support Workers (Office, Maintenance etc.) and No-sugarcane Workers. The Agriculture Workers were divided into Unskilled Sugar Cane Workers, Mechanization Agriculture Workers and Other Agricultural Workers. The results of this study show that in the last three years there was an increase in the number of people employed in industrial and administrative activities and also in the support of sugar and alcohol companies, what did not happen for agricultural activities. In this case, which the number of Mechanization Agriculture Workers increased, decreased, in much more significant absolute value, the number of Unskilled Sugar Cane Workers. The technological changes in harvesting and planting of sugar cane have been given such an intensity that even expanding the area and sugar the production, the number of unskilled rural workers have been declining. At the same time, the seasonality of employment of these workers during the year remained very high. Among other public politics, are suggested retraining programs for unskilled workers that have been fired of the sugarcane sector in Sao Paulo.