ASSOCIATIVISM AND AGRICULTURE: THE FAMILY FARMING IN ENTRE RIOS, ARGENTINA

The advance of a new phase of capitalism in Argentine agriculture in the last two decades resulted in the disappearance of thousands of producers, most of them of family nature. In this adverse context, is necessary to know if these production families resort to associative practices as a strategy to counteract the recurrent crises they face. This paper seeks to identify the relationship between the social form of family production and associative practices in Entre Rios. For this, the analytical category of family farming was constructed based on three variables: property management, legal form and type of work. Processed information from the National Census of Agriculture was used as a source. The main conclusions are: there is a great presence within the agrarian social structure of producer families which represented 77% of the farms surveyed in 2002 and occupied a third of the rural area of Entre Rios; on the other hand, is found that the majority does not practice associativism and the practice is linked to traditional institutions such as cooperatives and trade associations. Finally it is seen that only 16% of producing families engaged in associative practices compared to 25% of non-family farms, questioning the relationship between family farming and associativism.