Fomento florestal como fator de integração e estratégia de diversificação em pequenas e médias empresas rurais: estudo de casos

Abstract

This work consists of a case study, performed in the city of São Domingos do Prata, Minas Gerais, where the leading purpose of the research was to verify the planting of Eucalyptus spp. on small and médium sized landholdings as a strategical option of production diversification. The researched public is composed of ali the farmers who were benefited with grants of inputs needed for establishment of reforestment in the agricultural year 1992/1993. In order to verify the performance of forest fomentation programs, as an opportunity of Fered by the external environment to the farms involved in this process, the aspects relative to the allocation of both implantation and maintenance of forest densities were researched. With the view to verify the projections of the demand for forest raw matter in Minas Gerais, the research was based upon the intent of plantings manifested by the forest product users in therms of the use intended, namely, coal, firewood and lumber, in addition of the evaluation of production with the respective utilization of forest raw matter. With a view to raise liable information to point out the existence and/or preponderance of strong points which make the adaption of eucalyptus culture viable in these farms, an internal analysis of these production units was performed in accordance with the great areas, that is, production area, human resources area, commercialization and marketing area and finance area. The identication of the factors which enabled the reforestment activity to turn into a competitive advantage for the rural enterprises in the region, was accomplished through the survey of information concerning both the general and working environment with their respectives variables. The results obtained, gave rise to the following conclusions: the forest fomentation programs consist of opportunities for having as a actuation bases, the input allotment and offer of free technical aid, which provides the refreshment activity with economical results superior to those obtained by the traditional activities; the diversification of the forest product consuming market existing in the region leads to believe that, the refreshments on both small and medium sized landholdings can supply in part the consumption required by these markets; the establishment of the refreshment as a productive activity in the rural farms researched is not influenced by the internal conditions in those holdings but rather by external factors; there is evidence that competitive advantage can be obtained through interaction between the opportunities offered by the external environment and a few endogenous aspects of the investigated landholdings; it was found that there is a trend for the establishment of the reforestment activity to constitute a specialization factor for the most studied farm holdings.