Fronteira e modernização agrícola na Amazônia Legal: a experiência da Cooperativa Agropecuária Portuense LTDA - CAPPOL – Porto Nacional/TO (1963-2016)

Abstract

There is a relationship between border, agricultural modernization and cooperativism. In the expansion of the border, the agricultural frontier is one of the elements and what is sought is the agricultural modernization of these areas. One of the strategies of this modernization is the incentive to cooperativism. The Amazon is a frontier expansion area, which supports policies for agricultural modernization and cooperativism. Porto Nacional and surrounding areas are part of the Amazon and are part of this expansion of the agricultural frontier process, having the Agricultural Cooperative Portuense Ltda. (CAPPOL) as one of the references. The objective of this research is to analyze the relationship of CAPPOL with the expansion of the agricultural frontier and the modernization of agriculture in their areas of coverage. Regarding methodology, it was used: a) references, based on theoretical authors who have worked with the theme; b) field recognition; c) semi-structured interviews; d) documentary research (videos, websites, photos, newspaper, design, etc.); e) mapping the study area to obtain the GPS points; f) visits to public and private agencies related to the research. CAPPOL was born in the 1960s encouraged by technicians from Banco da Amazonia SA (BASA), the main function activities aimed to support livestock, especially cattle. Later on, with the institution of the Credit Association and Rural Goiás State Assistance (ACAR-GO) and Enterprise Technical Assistance and Rural Extension (EMATER) in Porto Nacional there is an incentive to modernization of agriculture in this county. CAPPOL underwent a modernization phase which at first was with the introduction of mechanized rice farming and in a second time with the rice and the introduction of soybean plantations. In addition, there was an expansion of infrastructure at CAPPOL. CAPPOL modernizes itself and also happens to be an agent / element of modernization. Later, CAPPOL decays, linked both to external factors to the cooperative, as the agricultural crisis and the cooperative crisis, and internal factors such as the loss of stored production, the disqualification from Production Financing Company (PFC), debt due to financing already consolidated, breaking technical production, decreased production in the coverage area, among others. At present, CAPPOL exists only legally and its infrastructure is leased to third parties, and its fate is still unclear.