Os estudos ciência, tecnologia e sociedade para análise dos cultivos de erva-mate no estado do Paraná, Brasil

Abstract

Yerba mate (Ilex paraguariensis) is a plant native to subtropical ecosystems in southern South America. Its main use is as an ingredient in drinks widely consumed in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay. Technological changes have transformed the production and consumption of yerba mate, helping to shape a sociotechnical system around the economic activity based on the plant. Cultivation systems are the most affected because they involve people and territories with environmental and economic sensitivities. It is studied the yerba mate cultivation system of family farmers who grow the plant next to remnants of Mixed Ombrophilous Forest (Araucaria Forest). The aim of the doctoral dissertation is to examine these yerba mate crops through the lens of analytical categories from Science, Technology and Society Studies (STS Studies). The dissertation is concerned with studying the technological changes in yerba mate cultivation, understanding them as part of the formation of a sociotechnical system. That is, a system that is the result of society’s interactions with technological artefacts and involves guidelines linked to technology in the social organization of economic activity. The methodology used qualitative research methods and techniques to analyze the cultivation systems, based on concepts from the CTS field and an interdisciplinary approach. Next, the sociotechnical system was characterized and social interactions with technological artifacts in yerba mate cultivation were problematized. The time frame included contemporary aspects, with the strengthening of public policies and technological institutions in Brazilian agriculture. The geographical section encompasses the mesoregions Centro-Sul Paranaense and Sudeste Paranaense, in the interior of the state of Paraná, in southern Brazil. As a result, the analytical category of STS Studies made it possible to evaluate yerba mate crops from this perspective. They pointed to the predominance of the technical aspect over the social. The experimentation and traditions of family farmers were weakened, pressured by technoscientific experiments and proposals from laboratories outside the cultivation systems. There has been a shift away from understanding the native plant as a technological artifact and a commercial product. Farmers therefore need to understand their capacity for technological action in order to consolidate their choices and relationships with the techno-scientific world.