Expansão da fronteira agrícola e transformações do espaço urbano em Regeneração, Piauí

Abstract

The expansion of the agricultural frontier in Brazil has caused significant changes in territorial relations, land use and city-country interactions. This process began in the 1950s, in the southern regions of the country, and moved to the Central-West, Northeast and North regions from the 1960s/1970s onwards, encouraged by state mechanisms, low land values, favorable environmental conditions and the existence of an attractive regional consumer market, causing a profound productive restructuring based on the modernization of the agricultural sector, the dissemination of agronomic technologies and management practices aimed at intensifying economies of scale, characteristics of globalized agribusiness. In Piauí, the consolidation of soybean agriculture as the main commodity and vector of expansion of the agricultural frontier stands out, causing significant socio-spatial changes in cities, especially medium and small ones. The municipe of Regeneração, in Piauí, is the object of this investigation, as it presents urban transformations resulting from its insertion in the grain agribusiness circuit. The study aims to identify the socio-environmental, political and economic factors that favor this insertion; characterize the urban spatial changes linked to the expansion of services and infrastructure aimed at the grain agribusiness; compare such transformations with other pioneering cities in the activity, in Piauí, and in other states; and evaluate the implications of these dynamics for the local urban structure. The research is based on bibliographic, documentary and empirical surveys, with the application of semi-structured interviews with public managers and peasants. Photographic records and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) were used for the spatial representation of the study area. The results of the research showed that there were no changes in the urban space of Regeneração in relation to the presence of services and infrastructure to meet the demands of agribusiness.