This work evaluates why extractive family farmers of COOPALJ (Small Farmers
Agroextractive Cooperative of the Lago do Junco municipality, Maranhão state)
accepted to practice cultivation without burning while others rejected it, and why
some initially accepted it and then gave it up. The cultivation without burning is a
technical encouraged by ASSEMA (Association for Settlement Areas in the
Maranhão state) and pursues the babauçu-trees preservation and the sustainability
of small farms. The research utilized the hypothetical deductive method supported by
semi-structured interviews and not participative observation. The results pointed that
farmers that accepted the no-burning cultivation as a technical innovation were those
with agricultural production systems likely to suffer various degrees of integration,
while for those who rejected the technical innovations there were a high risk of
transformation of production system and that could not be overcome. For the farmers
that persisted, the non-burn cultivation is not an alternative in relation to burning
cultivation but its complement for meet partially the technical, social, environmental
and productive goals, negotiated with the cooperative. These innovations include
partials acceptation or rejection, dropping or persistence and the farmers can to
appropriate of them, transform them and used them in other agricultural activities on
the property. On the other hand, adopting or rejecting of non-burning cultivation is
associated, respectively, with balance between labor and consumption or imbalance
in the agricultural system for meet the food needs of family members, the
abandonment of non-burning is associated with increase of imbalance between labor
and consumption after the adoption, and the persistence with the increase of
balance. Even farmers who have rejected the non-burning cultivation or give it up,
includes fields burned with practices from the non-burning cultivation in degrees and
different farm activities.
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