Perfil técnico e econômico da produção de coco no distrito de irrigação Curu-Paraipaba, estado do Ceará

Abstract

This study aimed to identify the technical and economical profile of coconut production in the irrigation district of Curu-Paraipaba, state of Ceará. The importance of the study was justified from the point of view that the referred project of irrigation exists for over three decades and currently has about 679 farms managed by small producers. We used a sample size equal to fifty and as tools of analysis, we used descriptive and tabular analysis of the collected data besides the techniques of factor and cluster analysis. It was reported that all establishments showed gross and net margin positive but that the level of income earned was considered low, taking as reference the variable profit. Then it was performed the identification of technical and economic factors. By the factor analysis from the method of principal components, it was identified the economic factor of producers that after varimax rotation, caught 48.89 % of the variance of the original variables. The technical factor caught 25.49 % of the variance. When the factor scores were got, it was identified three distinct groups of rural producers who showed differences at the technical – economical level among the family farmers interviewed. The best group identified consisted of only 7 individuals, who achieved good technical and economical results. Within the same process, it was identified a second group consisting of 38 individuals including farmers who did not get satisfactory economical results in 2012. It was also identified a group of 5 producers in decline stage. It was understood that the small producer interviewed has difficulty in getting working capital to operate his agricultural practices and his access to Pronaf credit could be an economically important alternative. The access to rural credit is difficult because the producers do not have the deed document of the establishments, so the main suggestion of a public policy to Curu-Paraipaba project is the implementation of an extensive process of land regularization, without cost to irrigating farmers of origin.