Analysis of Barriers that Affect the Transformation of Family Farmer Into a Rural Entrepreneur in Brazilian Context

Abstract

Despite importance of family agriculture, until the mid 90's, the Brazilian farmers had little or no access to credit and the existing public policies often do not meet the needs of this population. In 1996, the Brazilian government created the PRONAF - Program of Familiar Agriculture, first rural credit program designed exclusively for family farmers (FF) that despite numerous qualities, is facing challenges related to socio-cultural and psychosocial characteristics of farmers who do not always can incorporate the behaviors needed to be rural entrepreneurs (RE) in an industry that increasingly demand for innovation and development. This is the main objective of this study: to analyze the barriers faced by family farmers (FF) that affect its transformation into a rural entrepreneur (RR). To study these two groups, we interviewed and applied a structured questionnaire to a convenience sample, non-probabilistic, selected by the criterion of typicality of fourteen farmers who started their business in Southern Brazil. For these The analysis showed that the barriers to rural entrepreneurship were associated with lack of leadership and ability to take risks, and emphasized the importance of the family, social networks and formal education in the development of FF. We conclude that the FF can’t be regarded as typical Schumpeterian entrepreneurs, but some points have become critical to the implementation of public policies: a contingency approach; prioritize the targeting of resources to more entrepreneurial profiles; promote the objective and subjective evaluations of the results of resource allocation; strengthen training programs, management education and business incubators.