Land grabbing in Matopiba: the invisible actors of the territory
Territory. Financialization of Agriculture. Land Grabbing. Agricultural Borders. Deterritorialization
The remodeling of the structural axes in the spatial, social and commercial dynamics in Matopiba caused by human actions arising from agricultural expansion, which in turn is financed by developmental policies at the federal and state spheres and by the entry of international capital together with the appropriation of land and of nature, has been causing spatial transformations in this region, which is considered the main region with agricultural potential in Brazil.
In order to understand the territorial relations involved in the process of agricultural frontiers and the land grabbing a methodology based on a systemic approach was used in this research, which Miguel, Mazoyer and Roudart (2009) describe has been used in recent decades to analyze complex systems, such as rural and agrarian systems. In view of this context and the complexity involved in this subject, the objective of this thesis is to analyze the process of foreignization of land and the financialization of agriculture in Matopiba. The specific objectives seek to: I) identify the social actors involved in the agrarian process in Matopiba; II) analyze the impacts of land financialization and foreignization processes on the land market; III) establish an understanding around the dispute for the global governance of lands involved in the process of foreignization of land. For the purposes of analysis , the theoretical framework is based on discussions about territory
(FERNANDES, 2009; FERNANDES, 2013; CECEÑA, 2008) processes of capital expansion in the countryside (SILVA, 2016; ELIAS, 2002; ALBANO, 2005), land grabbing (LEITE; LIMA, 2017; PEREIRA, 2017; FAIRBAIRN, 2017). 2015), agricultural frontiers (SANTOS; SANO, 2015; MARTINS, 1996; FERNANDES; FREDERICO; PEREIRA, 2019; MARTINS, 2003). In addition to these texts, we also bring research that focused on Matopiba. The methodology used is quantitative-qualitative. Information collected from statistical data from agricultural establishments in the SIDRA-IBGE database, from the territorialization of the soil in the Mapbiomas database and from the foreignization of land in the reports of the DATALUTA Network, Pastoral Land Commission, World Bank, International Land Coalition. The data that make up the list of transnational capital companies involved in the land exploration process, refer to the lease, purchase and/or land use right by foreigners, were collected by the DATALUTA Network. The first results indicate that the between the states that make up Matopiba, for the years 2013 to 2020, Bahia was the territory with the highest recurrence of transnational companies, with diversified and consolidated uses of the land, such as (coffee, cotton and grains in rotation). As for land use, attention is drawn to alternative energies (solar and wind energy) concentrated in Piauí and Bahia, with investments originating in Germany, Spain, the United Kingdom and Norway. Land use in Tocantins presents a diversified behavior with grain production in rotation and commercialization of fruits and tree monocultures (understood in this research as eucalyptus, pine and other exotic species). The transformation of land into a land use process is the main generator of economic value, and therefore it is considered plural and complex interdisciplinary. And so, the land market in Matopiba is a potentiator of globalization applied in the territories of Matopiba.